My sister kissed my husband in front of thirty people at her own anniversary party and called it a joke. Her husband had a wrapped present in his hands and an envelope she had never opened.

I nearly choked on my water. Across the table, Tobin went red to the ears.

 

And I waited for my husband to say something, and he smiled into his glass.

“Romy. Don’t. He’s my husband.”

And she laughed at me as though I had said something ridiculous. “Oh, relax. You know I’m joking.”

She was at his elbow for the rest of that dinner, telling him what a wonderful husband he was, and she barely said four words to the man she had married a year earlier.

 

I told myself she was showing off.

What actually kept me awake was that Ellis let her.

“Why are you letting her do that?” I said, later, in the spare room.

“I love you, sweetheart. I’ll have a word with her.”

And I wanted to believe him, so I did.

 

The next day the rest of the family came for the party, and Tobin and I were carrying food out when there was a noise from the garden, and I came through the door with a dish in my hands and stopped.