As everyone chatted and drank, my phone buzzed in my bag. I ignored it, caught up in watching the faces of my friends and my children and even my ex-boyfriend. With the exception of Wally, Zadie, and Emma—and my elderly parents in Kentucky—everyone I truly loved sat at this table, on this sunny sidewalk, in this ancient city that had hosted a stream of human life for more than two thousand years. Georgia: telling a story, laughing so hard she snorted her drink through her nose. Beau, soaking it all in, consumed with pleasure at being included. Rorie, trying and failing to hide her fascination at the adult conversation. Compton’s wry commentary, Hannah’s radiant goodwill, Vani’s beneficence.

Later, looking back, this would become the moment in time from which I’d divide my existence into two sections. Mere moments later, I’d reach for my phone and know, immediately, that for me at least, nothing would ever be the same again.

9

The Dumbest Crime in History

HANNAH

SEVILLE, SPAIN

Hannah, seated next to Kira’s son, Beau, at the sidewalk café, turned to him somewhat shyly. She’d only seen him in person once before, when he’d been one or two years old, and since that time, obviously, he’d changed. He didn’t look much like Kira. She had a wiry build and wispy brown hair, which she kept cut short; he was little but sturdy, with wild curls, dark brown at the roots, lightening to a sun-kissed bronze at the ends of the springy coils. Hannah tried to recall the appearance of Kira’s husband, Daniel, but she’d seen him only in photographs.

Sensing her interest, Beau smiled at her, revealing a dimpled cheek. “Which friend are you?” he asked politely.

“I’m Hannah,” she said. “I live in California and I’m an ob-gyn.” Oops. Would a little boy have the faintest glimmer of the field of obstetrics and gynecology? Probably not. “That means I’m a doctor for ladies and I deliver their babies,” she added.

“Did you always know you would be a doctor?”