The black-and-white picture was of Heather and her husband, his arms wrapped around her from behind. She wore a button-down shirt that was open to show her enormous stomach, and both of them had their eyes closed, as though they were locked in a lustful embrace. It looked like something out of a porn fetish website.

“Stop,” I hissed.

She was undeterred. “Can you imagine what their sex life is like? I bet she keeps her shirt on.”

I smirked. “That, or she’s a lady in the streets but a freak in the sheets.”

“God, I hope so,” she said. “You know he keeps those Crocs on.”

I shifted and smiled sweetly at Violet Peterson as she inched by us, her plate overloaded with her husband Josh’s famous Buffalo chicken dip. Apparently, at the block party, Josh had told Mark it had just won an award. Mark said he didn’t realize Buffalo Chicken Dip Olympics was an event. I did find it odd that she always ate most of it at neighborhood gatherings, like she was hoarding her family’s appetizer talent. Although, she won, because it hadn’t even occurred to me to bring anything that night.

I had slowly gotten ready for the evening, sighing deeply as I looked through my clothes, hoping to get a text that the party was canceled. I offered to stay home multiple times with Mark, but he shut it down immediately, urging me to go out and have fun, especially after I confirmed that Liz wasn’t invited. So I threw on a maxidress that I had bought off Amazon last year that had faded from black to gray. It was long enough to cover my bandaged ankle, and this was the last group I wanted to watch me stammer out explanations.

“There’s an agenda,” Melissa said as she sidled up to us. In her hands, she held a piece of pink paper with Heather’s initials embossed at the top. She wore white linen pants and a pink short-sleeved top.

I scanned the paper.

8:00 p.m.: Wine, cheese, and light appetizers

8:30 p.m.: Welcome toast by Mrs. Hacker

9:00 p.m.: Presentation in the formal living room

9:30 p.m.: Proceed to the kitchen for the reveal

“Are you shitting me? We have to wait around until almost ten for the actual reveal? This is a hostage crisis,” Jess said. She reached forward and defiantly put a huge glop of artichoke dip on the Vera Wang grosgrain china appetizer plate. I only knew that was the pattern because Heather had lamented that it had gone out of production. “I should have made a playlist for tonight. All Cardi B and Nicki Minaj, just to scare everyone.”

A drop of the dip landed on Jess’s shirt, and she swiped at it with her finger and then wiped it off on her plate.

“I think this is more of a U2-and-Coldplay crowd,” I said.