Page 26 of The Phoenix Bride
She stares at her lap. A cloud outside shifts, casting a pane of sunlight over her hands, clasped tightly over her skirts.
“I have something to tell you,” Sara says.
“What is it?”
“I have been made an offer of marriage.”
I blink at her. I do not know how to react. She stares searchingly at me, awaiting a response. I look to the table, seeking a cup to hold, something to sip, to delay speech, but there is nothing. Weakly, I say, “Oh. So soon after…”
“The proposal came months ago, before Papa passed. I told him I needed time to think about it.”
“Who?”
“Joseph Alvarez.”
I frown. Alvarez is near twice her age. “The spice merchant?”
She laughs. “His son,” she says. “He has been traveling the past few years, as an apprentice, and I don’t know him very well. But we have met sometimes, to trade, and he has grown fond of me. He is younger than I am, but he is kind, and handsome, and he will help the business. I like him.”
“So, you will accept?”
She says nothing. She draws her finger across the edge of the armrest, in a gesture of uncharacteristic anxiety.
“Sara,” I say. “Why have you come?”
“I don’t know.”
With dawning dread, I ask, “To ask me permission? Is that it?”
She replies, “No, of course not. I suppose I am here only to—to make sure you won’t care.”
“I…I do care about you.”
“But not in the way I would like.”
I cannot respond. I shuffle on the seat. The rasp of my clothing against the cushion feels deafeningly loud.
I say, “After the funeral…”
“It was too soon, I know. You weren’t ready.”
She says it as if it is inevitable; as if someday, all the pieces of the world will pick themselves up as if they had never shattered, and I will be the man she imagines me to be. I wish I could believe that, also.
“I would marry you if you asked, David,” she says. “Surely you know that?”
I do know that. I have known for years now.
Sara smiles encouragingly at me, but yet again I do not know what to say. Awfully, I almost want to laugh. This all feels so unexpected, so incomprehensible, that I cannot understand it as anything but a cruel joke.
Sara says, “I think we could be good for each other.”
“What about Joseph Alvarez?”
“I don’t know him very well,” she replies. “I know you—at least, I have tried to know you, David. You are so withdrawn, so—somild,and I thought…I thought if I waited, eventually you would take the initiative.”
“But I didn’t,” I say.
“No, you didn’t.”
