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Dedication

For Derek, Wyatt, Noah, and Allegra

one

FRIDAY

Despite having put extra effort into drying her hair, into taming her brows, into all the routines that had become more exhausting and more necessary in the recent terrible years, Sarah arrived early to the meeting. Looking around the aggressively charming room, she was overcome with a scrubbed-clean sensation that she couldn’t immediately identify. Sarah reminded herself that there was no reason for this surge of positive feeling, that she’d surely have heard something over e-mail or text if there were any real reason for it. But when Caroline arrived in a burst of clashing patterns, with her thick black hair upswept in a jade-green banana clip that looked improbably fashionable, Sarah recognized the feeling; it had been a while: hope.

“Oh, honey,” Caroline said, with an enviably unrestrained hug. “I can’t believe it’s been a year.”

“I know.” Sarah nodded. “I know.”

“It always goes so fast, doesn’t it?” Caroline sat and whipped out a pair of plum-colored cat-eye reading glasses, quickly scanned the menu, and placed it facedown.

This year, Sarah thought; nothing fast about it.

“So,” Caroline began, “I don’t think you’re actually interested in what you sent me.”

“I’m not?”

“No. I’m sorry but you’re not. That’s not where the fire is. But,” Caroline said meaningfully.

“There’s a but.”

“I expect the world of you and always will. You know that?”

Sarah nodded dutifully.

“I have a suggestion. Are you open to hearing it?”

“Of course,” Sarah said, exasperated. “Of course I am.”

The waiter appeared. She became flustered while ordering—“I’ll just have what she’s having”—as if she needed Caroline to see any more evidence of her inability to think clearly. And of course Caroline insisted on ordering a bottle of Sancerre. Sarah had originally loved Caroline’s penchant for daytime drinking, and at the outset it always sounded like a great idea, but Sarah always felt slightly paranoid after sharing a bottle with her, as if she’d spoken too candidly or else had said too little.

“You look so nervous,” Caroline said, as the waiter walked away. “You don’t need to look like that. Not with me.” Her mouth twisted like a little fist before offering a smile more practiced than all the smiles that had ever preceded it.

This lunch, Sarah realized, might be our last.

Caroline leaned forward. “I think you should revisit the other script.”

Sarah felt a pulsing in her temples. “I told you I couldn’t do that.”