The rest was groceries and a bike and a bench and a man who picks up oranges without needing a toast.
And if there must be one more return to the lawn, let it be this:
Claire’s satin moves through summer air that smells like cut grass and wine. Patricia’s low voice tries to hold the night together with manners. Grant’s blazer opens as he turns. Riley’s pale green takes the light. James is still by the vans in his head. The microphone waits. The place cards wait. The hedge holds two people it should not hold.
Do not make a scene.
She makes a walk.
He is touching her.
At my dinner.
It is nothing.
Please.
Save it.
The unfinished toast sits in the glasses.
The lights, pretty and paid for, stay on as if beauty could argue.
Beauty cannot argue.
A waist argued.