I saw Claire look back over her shoulder, checking her aim. And I understood then what her special surprise was. She wasn’t going to leave it to chance. She was going to put that bouquet right in my daughter’s lap.
Claire turned around so her back was to the crowd. She lifted the bouquet. She gave it a little test-bounce in her hands.
And then, gently — so gently, not a real throw at all, just a soft toss up and back over her shoulder — she sent the bouquet arcing through the air.
I watched it turn, slow, the white roses and the trailing satin ribbon, up and over.
And it came down, soft as a landing bird, right into Mia’s lap.
Right into her lap.
The room made that sound a room makes — that “awww,” that collective breath, that sweetness. Mia looked down at the flowers in her lap and her whole face — I have never seen anything like it, before or since — her whole face broke open with pure, undiluted joy. Her mouth fell open. Her hands came up. She looked up at me, and she looked up at Claire, and she was laughing, this delighted, disbelieving laugh, and she reached down for the satin ribbon—
