Chapter 4 - The Price of Keeping the Peace
Camille was waiting in the bridal suite.
Her makeup remained flawless, but she had removed her veil. It lay crumpled on the sofa beside her.
When Isaiah entered, she stood immediately.
"Finally."
He closed the door.
"We need to talk."
"We certainly do. My family is humiliated. Guests are asking questions. People have their phones out."
Isaiah placed the rose and his father's photograph on the dressing table.
Camille looked at them.
Her expression tightened.
"You went looking for that?"
"I went looking for the memorial display we agreed to have."
"Isaiah, please don't start another argument about decorations."
"This isn't about decorations."
He told her about the seating chart.
The photography schedule.
The instructions to keep his mother away from the altar.
Camille listened without interrupting.
Then she crossed her arms.
"I made decisions because somebody had to."
"You deliberately excluded my mother."
"I organized a wedding that cost us months of planning and a ridiculous amount of money. Your mother kept questioning everything."
"She asked where her husband's picture was."
"That's what she said today."
Isaiah stared at her.
"What does that mean?"
Camille turned toward the window.
"You don't understand how she makes me feel."
"Then tell me."
"Every time I see her, she reminds me that she's the woman who raised you. That nobody will ever understand you the way she does."
"She's my mother."
"Exactly."
Isaiah waited.
Camille seemed surprised that he wasn't interrupting.
"At our engagement dinner, she told me marriage was about more than beautiful photographs. She made me feel shallow in front of your family."
Isaiah remembered the evening.
Evelyn had raised a glass and wished them patience, loyalty, and a home where both people felt respected.
He had thought it was a lovely toast.
Camille had barely spoken afterward.
"You interpreted a blessing as an insult?" he asked.
"It wasn't just that. She always has an opinion."
"Sometimes she does."
"And you always take her side."
Isaiah considered this.
There had been moments when he had failed to establish boundaries between his marriage plans and his family's expectations.
Once, his mother had offered advice about buying a home before the wedding, and Camille had felt judged. Instead of helping them discuss it, he had laughed off the disagreement.
He could admit that failure.
But it did not explain what had happened downstairs.
"If you wanted clearer boundaries, we should have talked about them," he said. "You could have told me you were uncomfortable."
"I did tell you!"
"You told me she was difficult. You didn't tell me you were removing her from our family photographs."
Camille's eyes narrowed.
"I knew you'd overreact."
Isaiah stepped closer.
"And you hit her."
Camille looked away.
"She embarrassed me."
"She asked a question."
"She came toward me when I told her to stay back."
"Did she touch you?"
Camille's silence lasted several seconds.
"She was being confrontational."
"That's not what I asked."
"Isaiah, why are you interrogating me like I'm some kind of criminal?"
"Because my mother has a mark on her face."
Camille's voice broke into anger.
"It was one slap!"
Isaiah went completely still.
Camille seemed to hear the words only after she had spoken them.
She lowered her voice.
"I didn't mean it like that."
"How did you mean it?"
She sat down heavily.
For the first time, she looked frightened rather than furious.
"I've spent my entire life trying to build something people respect," she said. "My mother used to be treated like she didn't belong in certain rooms. I promised myself nobody would ever look down on me that way."
Isaiah sat opposite her.
He had known about her childhood.
He knew how hard she had worked to become a successful marketing executive, how fiercely she protected the image she had built.
He could sympathize with the fear underneath her behavior.
But sympathy was not permission.
"My mother never looked down on you," he said.
"You don't know that."
"I know she tried to welcome you."
Camille rubbed her temples.
"Fine. I'll apologize."
Isaiah looked up.
"Then do it."
"But she has to admit she crossed a line by coming up to me after I told her not to."
He shook his head.
"That's not an apology. That's a negotiation."
Camille rose again.
"You're asking me to surrender all my dignity!"
"I'm asking you to take responsibility."
She approached him.
"Everyone's waiting. We can still finish this ceremony. We can fix the family problem afterward."
Isaiah glanced at the wedding gown, the expensive jewelry, the photographs arranged along the dressing table.
He had spent four years imagining a future with this woman.
Now she was asking him to stand beside her at the altar while his mother sat somewhere in the back, holding flowers with a bruised face.
"If we go out there," he said, "what happens to Mom?"
Camille's answer came too quickly.
"She can stay in the lounge until the ceremony is over."
Isaiah stood.
Camille caught his expression and realized what she'd said.
"That's not what I meant."
But the damage was done.
May you like
For the first time, Isaiah understood the price Camille expected him to pay for keeping peace.
And the person who would pay it wasn't him.
