The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight(37)
Author: Jennifer E. Smith

The man behind the desk finishes a phone call, replacing the receiver with a practiced flick of his wrist, and then turns to Hadley.

“May I help you, Miss?”

“I’m looking for the Sullivan wedding,” she says, and he glances down at the desk.

“I’m afraid that hasn’t yet begun,” he tells her with a clipped accent. “It will be held in the Churchill Ballroom at six o’clock sharp.”

“Right,” Hadley says. “But I’m actually just looking for the groom now.”

“Ah, certainly,” he says, ringing up to the room and murmuring into the phone before setting it down again and giving Hadley a crisp nod. “Suite two forty-eight. They’re expecting you.”

“I bet they are,” she says, heading toward the elevators.

When she knocks on the door to the suite, she’s so busy preparing herself for Dad’s disapproving frown that she’s a bit surprised to find Violet on the other side instead. Not that there’s a lack of disapproval there, either.

“What happened to you?” she asks, her eyes traveling all the way down to Hadley’s shoes before snapping back up again. “Did you run a marathon or something?”

“It’s hot out,” Hadley explains, glancing down at her dress helplessly. She notices for the first time that, in addition to everything else, there’s a comma-shaped streak of dirt at the hem. Violet takes a sip of champagne from a glass wreathed in lipstick marks, surveying the damage from over the rim. Behind her, Hadley can see about a dozen people sitting on dark green couches, a tray of colorful vegetables on the table in front of them and several bottles of champagne on ice. There’s music playing softly from the speakers, something instrumental and vaguely sleepy, but above that, she can hear more voices around the corner.

“I suppose we’ll probably need to sort you out again before the reception,” Violet says with a sigh, and Hadley nods gratefully as her phone—which she’s still clutching in one sweaty hand—begins to ring. When she glances at the name lit up on the screen, she realizes it’s Dad, probably wondering what’s taking her so long.

Violet raises her eyebrows. “ ‘The Professor’?”

“It’s just my dad,” she explains, so that Violet doesn’t think she’s getting strange transatlantic calls from a teacher. But looking down at the phone again, she feels suddenly deflated. Because what had once seemed funny now seems just a little bit sad; even in this—this smallest of gestures, this silliest of nicknames—there’s a sort of distance.

Violet steps aside like the bouncer at some exclusive club, ushering Hadley inside. “We don’t have much time before the reception,” she’s saying, and Hadley can’t help grinning as she closes the door behind her.

“What time does that start again?”

Violet rolls her eyes, not even bothering to dignify this with a response, and then retreats back into the room, arranging herself carefully on one of the chairs in her wrinkle-free dress.

Hadley heads straight for the small sitting room off to one side, which links the bedroom to the rest of the suite. Inside, she finds her dad and a few other people crowded around a laptop computer. Charlotte is seated before it, her wedding dress pooled all around her like some kind of sugary confection, and though Hadley can’t see the screen from where she’s standing, it’s clear that this is a show-and-tell of sorts.

For a moment she considers ducking back out again. She doesn’t want to see photos of them at the top of the Eiffel Tower, or making funny faces on a train, or feeding the ducks at the pond in Kensington Gardens. She doesn’t want to be forced to consider evidence of Dad’s birthday party at a pub in Oxford; she doesn’t need a reminder that she wasn’t there, had in fact woken that morning feeling the significance of the day like a weight around her neck, which trailed her through Geometry and Chemistry, all the way through lunch in the cafeteria, where a group of football players had sung a jokey version of “Happy Birthday” to Lucas Heyward, the hapless kicker, and by the end of their awful rendition Hadley had been surprised to discover the pretzel she’d been holding was nothing more than a handful of crumbs.

She doesn’t need pictures to know that she’s not part of his life anymore.

But he’s the first to notice her standing there, her dad, and though Hadley is ready for any number of reactions—anger that she left, annoyance that she’s late, relief that she’s okay—what she isn’t prepared for is this: something behind his eyes laid bare at the sight of her, a look like recognition, like an apology.

And right then, right there, she wishes for things to be different. Not in the way she’s been wishing for months now, not a bitter, twisted sort of wish, but the kind of wish you make with your whole heart. Hadley didn’t know it was possible to miss someone who’s only a few feet away, but there it is: She misses him so much it nearly flattens her. Because all of a sudden it all seems so horribly senseless, how much time she’s spent trying to push him out of her life. Seeing him now, she can’t help but think of Oliver’s father, about how there are so many worse ways to lose somebody, things far more permanent, things that can cut so much deeper.

She opens her mouth to say something, but before the words can begin to take shape, Charlotte beats her to it.

“You’re here!” she exclaims. “We were worried.”

A glass breaks in the adjacent room and Hadley flinches. Everyone in the sitting area is looking at her now, and the floral-patterned walls seem much too close.

“Were you off exploring?” Charlotte asks with such interest, such genuine enthusiasm, that it twists Hadley’s heart all over again. “Did you have fun?”

This time, when she glances in Dad’s direction, something in the look on her face is enough to make him stand from where he’s been perched on the arm of Charlotte’s chair.

“You okay, kiddo?” he asks, his head tilted to one side.

All she means to do is shake her head; at most, maybe shrug. But to Hadley’s surprise, a sob rises in her throat, breaking over her like a wave. She can feel her face begin to crumple and the first tears prick the backs of her eyes.

It’s not Charlotte or the others in the room; for once, it’s not even her dad. It’s the day behind her, the whole strange and surprising day. Never has any period of time seemed so unending. And though she knows it’s nothing but a collection of minutes, all of them strung together like popcorn on a tree, she can see now how easily they become hours, how quickly the months might have turned to years in just the same way, how close she’d come to losing something so important to the unrelenting movement of time.