“Look,” Tim said, sitting on the bed and pulling off his socks. “Forget the Wellfleets—we swim in different waters.”

Funny, I hadn’t even been thinking of them. And of course, they’d been insulted. Our abrupt exit had been rude, at the very least. Now the Wellfleets were added to my worries. It was safe to assume that in the weeks ahead, I’d see them frequently, and it would be awkward—from now on; forever, probably. But what worried me more, and what I started to tell Tim, was that I had greatly exaggerated my relationship with Anna Brody. He would have none of it, stating how proud he was of me for defending my friend.

“But you don’t understand—the words best friend were completely ludicrous.”

“Nothing else would have stopped them—”

“But to say best—”

“Okay, so maybe you were premature.”

“What do you mean, premature?”

“So she’s not your best friend now, but maybe one day up ahead she will be. And as Bruno likes to say, Kate, you have an innate capacity to envision the future.”

Then he kissed me, rolled over, and fell fast asleep.

How I envied the ease with which he did it. I was far from sleeping. The next day was to be my first day of work, and I felt nervous, with a tight knot in my stomach, and was plagued by a faint inner voice that said, Well, this is going to change everything.

Unable to sleep, I got up and checked the radio for the weather forecast, laid out my clothes, then ran a bath and used the boys’ Mr. Bubble. I even used their baby shampoo. If I smelled like them, then maybe they wouldn’t feel so far away. As my hair dried, I paced the apartment, finally sitting down at the kitchen table, where I wrote a note for the boys in crayon, explaining my whereabouts and how they were to have fun with Daddy and that I would be home soon, taking the fastest train I could.

The offices for Bruno Schwine and Associates were in Manhattan, on the ground floor of a pre-Civil War brownstone on Eleventh Street, just west of Fifth Avenue. Recently, Bruno had evicted a few therapists who had been renting office space for years. Bruno had lived upstairs since 1974. He’d bought the brownstone for one hundred and thirty-five thousand dollars: as he liked to say, “A fortune at the time.” Now it was worth millions.

I buzzed. While waiting, I looked through the wrought-iron grille-work of the downstairs windows. The front room was packed full with stacks of boxes and random pieces of furniture still wrapped in plastic. It became quite clear that my first days—weeks, even—would be spent more as office manager. Phones would need to be installed, walls painted, office supplies purchased, the works. There was much to do, and I had overdressed.

Bruno came out the parlor floor door and stood on the stoop, holding a cup of tea. Dressed in jeans and a cotton dress shirt but still wearing slippers, Bruno looked rested, with a dark tan, his salt-and-pepper hair dyed a deep reddish-brown. He’d gained back at least half the weight he’d lost. He looked terrific, and I told him so right away, and he said, “Well, I feel terrific.”