“Sorry.” I glance at my watch—it’s nine forty-five—as I’m pacing my tiny childhood room. “I can call again later. Or wait until you call me. Whatever works.”

“Christ on a crutch,” she snorts out. “So high strung. At least that didn’t change. What’s up?”

I’m stumbling all over myself trying to find the right words. I also suspect I’m crying again. I can’t help it. She is not giving me crap. She is not asking me where I’ve been the last six years. She is not making it difficult or awkward or awful.

I take a deep breath and try to sound as casual as she does.

“I’m in San Francisco.”

“Well, duh,” she yawns.

“You knew?” I ask, surprised.

“Renn told me.”

“You two talk?” I try to conceal my shock with a fake cough.

Pippa laughs harder. “Good to know you’re still doing that thing where you cough when you get nervous.”

“I’m not nervous,” I lie.

“Really? So why don’t you take your fingernails out of your mouth, missy?”

I realize I’ve been munching on them and do just that, then wipe my hand over my shirt. I’m amazed I have made it this far without talking to Pippa. She is the closest thing to Mom I have. She knows every piece of me. Even the bad ones. Especially those.

“We try to catch up once a month for coffee, Renn and me,” she explains.

“Neither of you drink coffee,” I say flatly.

“I said coffee? I meant beer.”

“He is not twenty-one yet.”

“That’s not what his fake ID says.” She laughs.

My mood is instantly lifted, even though Joe brushed me off and basically told me to go screw myself in his last message, though not in so many words.

I forgive you is code for Don’t worry about me. Just stay on your side of the continent and leave me the heck alone.

It goes against what I want to do, but I have to respect his wishes.

There’s a brief silence between Pippa and me before she sighs. “Fine. You can take me out for drinks and lunch.”

I laugh. “Thank you. Where do you want to go? Your choice.”

But I already know. We have a spot. It is the best restaurant in all of San Francisco.

“Wayfare Tavern. And I’m ordering cocktails. A lot of cocktails. Watch me blow up that bill.”

“Go ham. When?” I ask.

“Noon. Don’t be late.”

She hangs up.

I stagger out of my room. It’s a Monday, and Renn is at college and Dad is at work. Donna is sitting in the kitchen, reading the paper and listening to the radio like it’s the nineties or something. She laughs at something the radio host says. She is pretty endearing, in a you-are-still-not-my-mom sort of way.