He wanted an audience.

He always wanted an audience.

Beside him, Bianca, in a tight designer dress and far too much sweet perfume, touched his arm with a tenderness so engineered it was almost impressive.

“He’s right, sweetheart,” she said, smiling in a way that was neither kind nor subtle.

“You really should have known when to leave gracefully.”

And at the far end of their table, my former mother-in-law, Marion, regarded me with cold delight.

“Some women,” she said, to no one and to everyone, “simply do not deserve the comfort they marry into.