She nods.
A few dayspass before Weggers deigns to make time for Hanna and me to come to his office to discuss “the situation.”
Neither of us knows what to expect. Weggers hasn’t distinguished himself as flexible in the past. On the other hand, none of us has failed quite this dramatically yet, so we don’t have any experience with the begging-for-mercy route.
Weggers sits behind his desk with his eyebrows arched like a short, bald, self-important supervillain while I confess my sins.
I give him a slightly more redacted version of the last few days than I gave Hanna—but it contains essentially the same information. And it makes me remember all the things I’m not saying. The moments between the moments—Doritos and Indian takeout and Eden’s shy delight when I retrieved the laundry. (More evidence that she’s only been with assholes.)
The feel of her hair between my fingers, her mouth hot under mine.
I shove down how much I miss her, because it’s a fact that doesn’t—can’t—matter.
“I did everything I could,” I tell him. “I followed her to Sioux Falls so she could try to reconcile with him?—”
This is not an exact rendering of my motives, but give me a break; this is Weggers we’re talking about.
“Remember when we talked about this, in the beginning. You said if the wedding got canceled for reasons that had nothing to do with me, you’d take it under advisement.”
He makes aHmmmsound.
“Please,” I say. “Don’t punish Hanna because this marriage wasn’t meant to happen. I tried.”
Weggers lets me suffer while he hems and haws, wrings his hands, then rises and paces. Hanna starts to speak, and I can tell she’s filled with righteous rage, so I give her a pleading look and she shuts the fuck up, thankfully. Hanna is not a Weggers whisperer. She’s not an anyone whisperer, although she does seem to know how to handle brides.
More pacing. A lot of throat-clearing and sighing. He consults a thick book on his bookshelf, which turns out to be the dictionary.
Then he says, “Iwilltake it under advisement.”
“Meaning we’re off the hook for this one?”
“Meaning I’ll investigate further and inform you of my decision.”
A shudder passes through Hanna, and I give her anotherPlease don’t make this worselook.
“Thank you,” I say.
As soon as we’re out of his office, she lights into me.
“You let him— How can you let him be such an uptight little pretentious self?—”
“He’s impossible,” I agree. “But getting into it with him is only going to make this worse for all of us.”
“What if…?”
Her expression is anguished.
“I won’t let you lose Hott Springs Eternal. I promise.”
“You can’t promise that. You don’t know.”
“I fucking know,” I say.
What I mean isI will fight for you with the last bone in my body. She’s right. I can’t actually know that I’ll win. But I’ll go down swinging.
“I’ll talk to Matias,” I tell her.
“Matias—”
