The ring sparkled so brightly on Clara’s finger she couldn’t stop staring at it. No matter that she was meant to be mingling with her colleagues and their guests rather than admiring her own hand like a mannequin in a Benetton window. Five years after graduation, six years after they’d become inseparable, seven years since she’d first set eyes on him, she was really, finally, and forevermore going to be Mrs. Benny Tiffin. Around the three-year mark her friends had started questioning if it would ever happen at all. But Clara had always known that there could be no better match than her and Benny, and that he would propose when they were both good and ready. The fact that he’d chosen to do so right before the holidays meant she had ample opportunities to show off her platinum-set proof.
She stole a glance across the hotel lobby, where her company holiday party was assembling before dinner. Benny was in line at one of the bar carts, talking congenially with her boss and looking eloquent as ever in a three-piece suit purchased for the occasion, his red tie and vest a precise match to her new cocktail dress. While they were by no means a large publisher—a collection of fine art imprints that just happened to call the Midwest home—the execs had gone all out this year, compensating for the previous Christmas’s no-budget-is-met-so-no-party-we-get fail by renting out a whole wing of Lakeside Lodge. She’d heard some of her coworkers with kids grumbling about the implication that they were to stay overnight, the complication of finding babysitters this time of year, and on and on. But she was happy to have the chance to drink without worrying about the drive home. She and Benny had even packed swimsuits to make fools of themselves in the indoor water park come morning. Why not? They were giddy in their love, untouchable.
Her boss, Graham, was a nice man—almost too nice for good management, really. You could tell he had a hard time drawing lines where lines were customarily drawn. But then again, he’d started out as an artist, then worked in academia, and then taken the job overseeing their high-end coffee table books. That wasn’t exactly a trajectory toward toeing the corporate line.
As she watched Graham clap a congratulatory hand on Benny’s shoulder, she felt a jolt of pride in them both. Graham’s team at the young imprint was composed of fairly green, overeager professionals, and they played right into the “work family” dynamic, both squabbling among themselves and covering for one another like siblings.
Clara was part of the foursome in editorial, along with Matt, the before-his-time hipster with so many computer monitors in his cubicle they called it Mission Control; Steve, the frat boy–turned–pseudoresponsible adult; and Liv, who always seemed unduly nervous about everything but then again probably should have been, given her penchant for both contributing to and distributing office gossip. They had a standing weekly happy hour, their quartet plus whomever else someone might rope in, and were at ease with one another in a way Clara took for granted. She was too young to know to be self-conscious, too na?ve to worry the next morning about that comment she maybe shouldn’t have made after that third beer she maybe shouldn’t have had. She hadn’t yet learned that age and experience had a way of making you guarded, even in aspects of life you didn’t necessarily need to guard. And that when it came to things truly worthy of such protection, they could make you wide-eyed with insatiable worry.
In that moment, the whole of her thoughts were occupied by her fun work friends and her sparkly diamond ring. Matt and Steve had just reappeared and were scanning the crowd for their dates, and she raised an eyebrow at their telltale glassy eyes betraying their not-entirely-legal smoke break.
“The banquet room’s ready for us,” a voice from behind her said. She turned and caught the teasing glint in Liv’s eye. “And not a moment too soon. If I had to watch you lovingly gaze from Benny to your hand and back again much longer, I’d be sick.”
Clara bit her lip. Liv was newly unattached—she’d broken up with her boyfriend over Thanksgiving—and still feeling the sting of having no plus-one. Although she had brought a date, Dale, a good-looking gay friend who’d already earned his meal ticket just by drawing looks of envy at Liv from female staffers who didn’t know better. Clara herself had mistaken Dale for a boyfriend when they’d first been introduced, at a pool party last summer. He was the kind of guy who was almost everyone’s type, with an outgoing personality and a quick athletic build that had him carrying their half of the sand volleyball court to easy victories. She’d thought it was sweet how playful and affectionate he was with Liv, though she came to realize he was like that with most all of his friends.
“Sorry,” she said. “You should probably keep your distance. I can’t seem to help myself tonight.” It was true. She blamed the twinkling lights strung overhead, the garland catching the simulated candlelight from the chandeliers, the drinks flowing on her employer’s dime, the piano player in the corner who was doing a damn good job crooning Bing Crosby–esque Christmas classics.
Liv smiled at her, only a hint of wistfulness showing through. “I know that look. This is one of those perfect moments for you, isn’t it? When you suddenly look around and just love everyone? When you feel that everything seems so wonderful you just want to freeze-frame it in your brain?”
Clara gave her hand a squeeze, then dropped it as Dale approached. She was glad he was here for Liv. Clara had been the designated postbreakup sounding board at work, but Liv’s ex-boyfriend had come off as such a creep—always stirring up some sort of on-again-off-again melodrama—that weeks later Clara was having a harder time mustering a sympathetic ear. One of the warmest people she knew—at least, when she wasn’t licking her wounds—Liv so clearly deserved better. But she wasn’t going to reassure her of that for the one hundredth time tonight. No, tonight belonged to her and Benny. She was going to go ahead and be nauseatingly happy, and anyone who didn’t like it could go be nauseated somewhere else.
“It’s time for Graham to carve the roast beast!” Matt called out, and the crowd around them laughed.
“Graham the Grinch?” someone called out. “Hardly!”
“He was the big-hearted version by dinner,” Graham shot back, and a second ripple of laughter followed him.
Matt and Steve had located their girlfriends and were strolling gallantly toward Liv and Clara, arm in arm, like they belonged in an old-fashioned formal promenade.
“I will allow the giddiness from you tonight, but these clowns better tone it down,” Liv mumbled, and Clara laughed.
Then Benny was wrapping his arm around her waist, and Dale started doing a Yellow Brick Road dance toward the ballroom that made Liv laugh harder than she had for weeks, and they all filed in to find their place cards at the circular tables. Their company was not particularly large, but when everyone had a guest, the doubled crowd was impressive. Soon the room was loud with clanging silverware, clinking glasses, chatting, and laughter. Salads were ready at each place setting, warm rolls were passed, and entrees under silver domes were gallantly served. The top managers stood and gave year-end toasts during dinner; Graham went last, speaking over the bustle of the waitstaff’s valiant efforts to unobtrusively clear the plates, beginning with, “A word from our sponsors…” and ending with Clara and Liv teary eyed with gratitude, and Matt and Steve rolling their eyes in a way that only half hid their own emotion.
“Are you guys hiring?” Benny murmured into her ear. “Because I suddenly realize my company has a way bigger stick up its ass.”
“We’re creatives. It’s not our fault the stereotypes about accountants are true.”
“And yet you’re marrying one.”
“I guess there’s no accounting for taste.” She winked at him. “Get it? Accounting?”
“I wonder if it’s too late to get my own room?” Benny mused.
“Where is your room?” Liv asked, leaning across the table so only Clara could hear. “And do you have any clear nail polish in it? I’ve got a run in my nylons, but we’re a hike to the end of the wing.”
Clara self-consciously crossed her bare ankles beneath her. “Sorry. Can’t stand the feel of those things on my legs! And I’m lazy about my nails.”