Part 2: Priya's Plan

Priya listened while I explained that I might attend but did not want an unexpected conversation with my father. She did not ask me to tell her the whole history. She asked what arrangements would help me feel able to leave or take a break.

We agreed that I could arrive through the side entrance, sit near June's friends, and use a quiet room if I needed time away. Sam would speak with my father before the ceremony. Priya would make sure I had her number and a way to contact her during the reception.

“Do you want anyone to tell guests why?” she asked.

“No. They can know I'm June's brother. The rest is private.”

“Understood.”

I asked what would happen if my father approached me despite the agreement. Priya said she or Sam would intervene, and I could leave without giving an explanation. She did not promise that she could control every person in the room. She promised a response they had prepared together.

After the call, I walked downstairs to the bookshop. The owner, Mrs. Ellis, had known me since I rented the workshop. She asked why I was carrying an envelope as though it might bite.

“My sister invited me to her wedding.”

“That sounds like good news.”

“It is. My father will be there.”

She did not ask for details. She made tea and told me about a customer who had tried to return a book because the ending was sad. The ordinary conversation helped me breathe.

That evening June sent a photograph of the garden. She had marked the side entrance and the path to the quiet room. I thanked her and asked whether the object from our mother was something she wanted to show me before the wedding.

“It's a notebook,” she wrote. “I found it in a box at Aunt Rosa's house. It has recipes and notes in her handwriting.”

Our aunt had died the previous year. June had been helping her daughter sort the remaining belongings. She said she would not bring the notebook to the wedding unless I wanted her to. It was not a condition of attending.

I asked if she could send a photograph of one page. She chose a recipe for apple cake. Our mother had written, “Add more cinnamon if the kitchen smells too serious.” I could almost hear her laughing as she said it.

The photograph made me want to see the notebook. It also made me aware of how much I had missed: June's school performances, birthdays, and the years she spent believing I had chosen to disappear. We had talked about those years, but a single conversation could not return them.

I called her again. “I'd like to come,” I said. “And I'd like to see the notebook, if we can do that separately from the reception.”

“We can meet the day before. Sam can be there, or not.”

“Sam can come. He can tell me whether the cake recipe is accurate.”

She laughed. “He's tested it twice. The second one was better.”

I sent the reply card the next morning. Then I booked a room at a hotel rather than staying with family. The decision was practical and gave me a place to go if the day became too much. I wrote Priya's number on a card and put it in my wallet beside the photograph of June and me.