They opened up slightly, gesturing for Alex to join them. The three girls raised their hands toward each other and spun in little turns, closing their eyes and bobbing their heads to the music. Alex rarely felt like part of their dynamic, but in moments like this, she was close enough. She wasn’t just Paul’s best friend: she belonged to these girls, too, connected to them in her own unique way. It was odd, her almost primal need for their approval and acceptance, her extraordinary joy when she received it.

Feeling emboldened, she wove her fingers through Sophie’s, spinning her gently as they mouthed along with the lyrics.

“I hate my hair,” Sophie offered in a rare moment of vulnerability, catching herself in the mirror as she turned. “It never does anything but sit there.”

“You have French girl hair,” Alex responded. “It’s chic.”

They looked at each other in the mirror again, a little smile quirking the corners of Sophie’s pink lips.

“Don’t inflate her ego any further,” Bee chided, bobbing over to top up their glasses of wine. “She already knows she’s gorgeous.”

Sophie tossed a crumpled-up tissue at her in faux outrage. The two of them smiled at each other, effortless in their friendship. Moments like this would usually create a small pit of envy in Alex’s stomach. But now, basking in the glow of her own excitement about the night, she felt nothing but affection for them—and a twinge of sadness that they would soon be on opposite ends of the world.

“You look cute,” Bee observed, touching Alex’s expansive curls from behind her.

“Thank you,” she replied, setting down her powder compact after a final pass on her nose. “I tried.”

“Well, you succeeded.” Bee’s warm words trailed off into distraction. Her eyes were now fixated on her phone, reading a new message. “DNR want to know what we’re wearing.”

“A black dress,” Alex offered automatically, as if Bee couldn’t see that for herself.

“Tell them we don’t know yet,” Sophie interjected.

DNR was their rather acerbic nickname for Daphne and Renee, a pair of ice-blonde sisters Bee knew from prep school. Daphne was the older of the two, a math genius currently studying at Carnegie Mellon. She was beautiful and delicate like Bee, while her younger sister Renee had a distinct harshness, a bratty reluctance to do anything according to expectations. And their father was one of the most powerful executives at Barclays bank, a man whose sheer wealth and access made their own successful futures a foregone conclusion. Their presence always reminded Alex that once you’re a certain kind of rich, it doesn’t matter what you do. You’ll always succeed, even against your own will.

“I didn’t know they were coming,” Alex chirped, feeling unusually generous. “That’ll be fun, I love Daphne.”