“No, you didn’t. I haven’t been married for as long as the happy couple over there, but I’ve been with Sean for fifteen years, and I had to learn to fight with him the same way I had to learn how to fight with my sister, and with my roommate in college. Even a few times with Cecy.”

Surprise must show on my face at that last one, and she shrugs.

“She could’ve won that window competition, you know. The point is . . . sometimes fighting isn’t about leaving, it’s about staying. It takes practice to get it right, and it’s painful, but if you want to stay with people, you do it.”

Something sparks in my circuit board then, some wire livening with its new connection. I haven’t fought with anyone in years and years, have shoved down even the smallest inclination. Boyfriends I drifted away from for one thing or another—one who lied to me about smoking cigarettes at night, one who never let me finish a sentence before trying to complete it for me, one who I always suspected was seeing someone else, too. No great losses, but it wasn’t as though I tried to press the point. Worse is the thought of friends I have scattered throughout Manhattan and here—including Lachelle, including Cecelia—who I’ve kept at a distance. I had Sibby, after all. Sibby who already knew all the hard things about me, and I’d never have to fight with her.

Except I do, I think, straightening up in my chair, suddenly feeling starkly, shockingly sober. I have to start a fight with Sibby, if I want us to stay friends after she leaves. I have to continue a fight with Lark, if I want us to become friends.

And I have to finish a fight with Reid—I have to do it right this time—if I want us to . . .

If I want us to be more than friends.

It’s a revelation, but it’s not an easy one. Even at the thought of it—more confrontation, more moments of getting it wrong—my palms feel clammy, my fingers weak. I think fleetingly about my desk at home, the wasteland of attempts and failures from the last week. Holding a pencil has felt like holding a thousand pounds of weight.

“Practice,” I repeat, and I can hear the way it sounds disbelieving, suspicious.

“Listen, Meg,” she says, reading my tone. “You didn’t come to this city and teach yourself your craft and start your own business because you’re weak. And you don’t make nice with your clients and get them to trust you the way they do because you’re weak, either. You practiced getting along with people. You can certainly practice not getting along with them, too.”