Gala nights turn men into mirrors. They reflect other people’s wealth, hunger, vanity, fear—anything shiny enough to pass for value. I walked Cheyenne through the doors and felt the museum take our temperature the way a host checks a roast. The lighting was excellent, which is to say forgiving. Marble absorbed sound like it had been paid to. Champagne moved in loops. The music kept a tasteful distance, never loud enough to force honesty.
She had chosen blue—the kind of midnight fabric that doesn’t beg the eye so much as teach it manners. The dress did what a good boundary does: disappeared once it served its purpose. Heads turned anyway. Not at the dress. At her composure. She belongs in rooms she chooses to belong to. I chose this one; she chose herself.
“Smile and your name,” I said un
