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Back A Small Affair Save as PDF
Chapters (54)
  1. Cover
  2. Praise
  3. Dedication
  4. About the Author
  5. Part One
  6. 1
  7. 2
  8. 3
  9. 4
  10. 5
  11. 6
  12. 7
  13. 8
  14. 9
  15. 10
  16. 11
  17. 12
  18. 13
  19. 14
  20. 15
  21. Part Two
  22. 1
  23. 2
  24. 3
  25. 4
  26. 5
  27. 6
  28. 7
  29. 8
  30. 9
  31. 10
  32. 11
  33. 12
  34. 13
  35. 14
  36. 15
  37. 16
  38. 17
  39. 18
  40. 19
  41. Part Three
  42. 1
  43. 2
  44. 3
  45. 4
  46. 5
  47. 6
  48. 7
  49. 8
  50. 9
  51. 10
  52. EPILOGUE
  53. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  54. Booklist

Page nods, still leaning forward, her breasts balanced on the table. “Her friends feel bad for me all alone in this house. They keep inviting me to things, but I don’t want to embarrass myself. I know I don’t know how to act here. But you, you’re so confident, so well put together. So New York. You know how all these people operate. You’ve worked in luxury fashion. You’ve spent time with people like them. You saw how they treated us at the ceremony, like they didn’t even know how to engage with us—like my family and I are from another planet. I want you to tell me how to fit in.” She pouts, ever so slightly, her brows drawing together in a look of consternation.

I lean back, cross my arms, stare Page down. “I’ll think about it,” I answer finally, after a beat of silence. “But only because, maybe, I owe you.” An admission, a confession, grounded in reality or not: I owe you for inadvertently killing your sister.

3

ODILIE

Ten years ago

Odilie counted the days until Peri’s next appointment; she highlighted it in the antiquated office calendar system as close to magenta as she could get on the ten-year-old computer, to match Peri’s nails. The color, it glowed from the screen like a treasure.

Finally, the day arrived and Peri was late, gliding in without a second glance at Odilie. Odilie felt her chest deflate, like her actual beating heart was flat as a pancake.

But she knew exactly when Peri would exit the squat, stucco office and vanish with the setting sun. After checking out Mr. Elphonso, an aging man with leery eyes and a leathery hide, Odilie turned off her computer and hustled out of the practice a few minutes early, making her way to her car.

Peri had paid in advance. There was no credit card to be processed, no insurance to be checked. Odilie had gotten permission to leave a few minutes early that evening.

She got into the car, unfolded the mirror and brushed her hair, redid her eyeliner, swiped Chapstick across her thin lips. She could have done all of it in the employee bathroom with its garish artificial lights, the white tiles like cleaned teeth. But the car gave her more space, more breathing room. A chance to position herself and her next move, to spot Peri before she even entered the parking lot.