At the wedding — which was a large Catholic wedding at a hotel ballroom in Detroit, paid for largely by August's family, with a full mass beforehand and the whole traditional structure intact — Cecile gave the maid of honor toast at 8:47 PM, halfway through dinner, right before the cake was supposed to be cut. She started the toast beautifully. She talked about eighth grade. She told a funny story about me falling off a bike in college. She made the room laugh. She made my mother tear up. She made August smile. And then, at about the two-minute mark, she pivoted. She said — in a voice that was perfectly composed, not drunk, not slurring — "You know, everyone in this room sees the woman standing next to August tonight and sees her confidence and her grace. But what you don't know — what I know, because I have been her best friend for fourteen years — is how much this woman has survived. I want to tell you something that she is too modest to tell you herself. But I think you all need to hear it. Because it is a testimony to the woman August just married. At twenty-two years old, my beautiful friend had an abortion she told nobody about. And she has carried that secret, alone, for eleven years, until the night she told me — and I promised her, that night, that I would make sure the whole world knew how brave she was. Eleanor. You are so loved."