He hadn't exactly been expecting her to be thrilled about this turn of events, but he certainly hadn't expected the explosion that followed. Alfred's brow knit in confusion. Obviously she couldn't really mean that. Obviously he cared. The problem was that he cared too much for them to just carry on as they had been before — and maybe from her perspective, it might be a problem too that he didn't care enough to have agreed to leave with her, on Thursday.

"Well, what did you want?" he asked tensely. That was maybe the wrong question, though, because he might have already known, and it wouldn't do either of them any good to say it aloud. Maybe a better question was: "What were you expecting? I'm getting married!"