“Not with the porch light. Come on.” Alice grabbed my hand. “You’ll love this.”

Alice, Bettina, and I tromped out onto the back porch. Alice flicked on the light and started down the steps to the yard. “Come on.” She wavered in her clunky heels through the lawn. I followed, glad I’d chosen ballet flats instead of the pumps I’d been eyeing in my closet, though I hoped it wouldn’t be mucky out there anyway. It was dark, but I could make out that Bettina’s backyard was shaped like a slice of pizza, rounded on the left side and tapering into a long triangle down to the right, where her neighbor’s yard cut it off with a tall fence. Alice headed toward the wider end, where the grass stopped at a darker weedy section that bumped up against a small shed.

“Hold on, Alice,” Bettina called, striding past us. “I don’t want you messing anything up.”

Bettina stepped into the growth, which swallowed her legs to the knee. As I got closer, I saw it was a mass of vines twisting around one another. Bettina gently pushed some aside, and the light from the porch illuminated a giant, plump pumpkin, nestled on a bed of soil. It had shifted slightly when Bettina moved the leaves, as if it we’d interrupted its slumber.

“She grows them every year,” Alice gushed. “Just for the party.”

“They’re autumn golds,” Bettina said, brushing aside another set of vines so I could see another hint of orange below. “For jack-o’-lanterns.” Bettina’s head was in shadow, and I imagined her as a fairy-tale sorceress, vines tightening around her toothpick legs and dragging her into the ground.

“Very cool,” I said. “I’m impressed. Even my fake cacti die on me.”

“You have to be pretty persistent about it,” Bettina said. “I have to grow them inside for a few months. If you plant them outside too early, the cold will kill them. And then, once they start to grow, you have to come out here and turn them, so they don’t grow lopsided. Every year I lose a few, even so.”

“But there’s usually one for each of us girls.” Alice beamed, clapping her hands. “And this year there’s five. It’s like it’s meant to be.”

Meant to be. I felt myself getting that warm feeling again. The universe was shifting, all the pieces fitting together. It was meant to be—the house, the street, the party.

The Ivy Five.

“Wow, five good ones,” I said, trying not to sound too excited.

And five good moms. Shrewd. Well-dressed. Reliable. Pretty. Popular.

“Well, I won’t know that until I cut them off the vine in another week or so.” Bettina’s chilly voice returned. “Sometimes one rots.”

FIVE

Kendra