She handed them a form and left. Aiden froze up around the planning because it had never entered his imagination that he was allowed a wedding, so Rachel filled it out herself.

Rachel and Aiden

Color scheme: Sand and navy. Basically, the least-sexy colors.

Food: The simplest, no bloated appetizers or heavy meats.

Venue: A restored inn where something unspeakable has happened.

Marriage ritual location: On the beach, with no folding chairs except for the older folks.

Reception/dinner location: A cloth tent with pillows on the floor.

Officiant: ???

Lighting: Candelabras.

Music: Small orchestra. No pop-DJ-cover-band-fuckery.

Decor: Grandmother insists on ice sculptures for the reception. The ice sculptures will depict pansexual orgies.

Floral arrangements: Hanging upside down. Blue.

Gifts: Only drought-resistant plants or trees that will grow in our canyon home.

Alicia returned, read their form, then pulled out champagne from a special resting place under her distressed table. After she sent her assistant home, the three of them ordered Thai and Alicia opened another bottle. In a moment of drunk confessional delight, the couple told Alicia all about Rachel’s grandmother and Aiden’s gender.

“Ohh, me likey. Me really likey,” Alicia said, sucking on every detail, so happy that she briefly regressed.

Hearing all this, I respected Rachel more, knowing that she was not simply trying to reproduce her family ways.

One quiet morning post-smoothie, I was loading the dishwasher at Blithe’s when the older Operatrix in circular sunglasses beamed in, with an herbal cigarette moving in and out of the hologram.

“Good. You have the ring at least. Now I have something useful for you to do,” she said. “We need a risk assessment of Aiden’s parents. We would like them to be involved in the wedding but are concerned that might create an unmanageable situation. You will go and meet with them. Say that you’re a friend of Aiden’s and that you have some news about him. See how they react.”

After everything, the Rhiz was sending me to the literalized Shadowlands of Aiden Chase.

“Fine,” I said sulkily. I didn’t appreciate this Operatrix insinuating that I wasn’t doing enough. Hadn’t the inversion countered the hex? Hadn’t the Rhiz started courting me? She reminded me of Margot telling me to pick up my clothes off the floor.

“I’ll send over a specialized Bio-meter and some data,” she said, and was gone.

Blithe said I could borrow his car again if I promised to pick up dried daylilies for a special soup. I found a specialized Bio-meter in its sleeve by the front door, along with a manila envelope, stamped with a magenta seal. The orb was the same size as the regular ones but only measured anger and fear across the entire color spectrum. Inside the envelope:

Chase Family profile

Here we use absence as presence. We must measure the family affect through the son.

Mother: He may feed himself the choicest strawberries, but they drop down into a hole.