It was Claire. She could make you feel both criticized and protected.

A few months earlier, I had introduced Ryan to my family for Christmas dinner. He arrived with wine for my father, flowers for my mother, and that easy, trusting smile even before he’d finished introducing himself. My parents took to him immediately.

Claire then entered through the kitchen, looked at him and froze.

Ryan looked up, and for a long second, they stared at each other. Neither of them spoke.

An eerie silence fell around the table. I remember thinking how unusual that silence was.

During dinner, Claire asked Ryan where he had lived, what jobs he had held, and if he still moved around so much. Later, as I cornered her by the sink, I whispered, “Can you please stop?”

“I’m asking questions, Ally.”

“You’re provoking him, Claire.”

She glanced over my shoulder towards the dining room. “Perhaps you should ask him why he makes me want to…”

It stuck with me. When I mentioned it to Ryan later in the car, he just shrugged slightly.

“Maybe your sister just doesn’t like me.”

He said it gently, almost softly, as if I were making a big deal out of it. It was perhaps the first moment when something shifted, even if I didn’t realize it at the time.

The closer the wedding date approached, the more Claire became a stranger.

One evening, the four of us were sitting around my parents’ dining table, eating a roast, when Claire suddenly put down her fork and looked me straight in the eyes.

“You should reconsider your plan to marry him, Alice.”

My mother froze, her glass halfway between her mouth and her mouth.