“Some of it,” Benjamin laughed. “You always say that. You remember all of it. You just don’t like to say so.” A pause. “Victoria.”
Benjamin said the name clearly, casually, the way you drop a stone into still water without expecting much.
Rebecca set down the dish cover.
She was not sure why that name made her hands go still. She told herself it was a common name. It meant nothing. She stayed where she was and did not move.
“Benjamin,” she heard Mr. Caleb say. His voice was quiet and careful. A warning, almost.
But Benjamin was already moving forward the way old friends do, the ones who earned the right long ago to say things others would not dare.
“I’m just saying,” Benjamin said with a smile in his voice that Rebecca could hear even from the kitchen. “She was a good girl, Victoria. She deserved better from you, my friend. We both know that.”
He chuckled.
“Running away when she told you she was pregnant? Honestly, Caleb, I was ashamed of you.”
Silence followed, the kind that has weight to it.
“That was a long time ago,” Mr. Caleb said. His voice had gone very flat, very still.
“30 years,” Benjamin agreed. “Exactly.”
He paused, as if considering whether to say the next thing. Then he did.