She’d planned to live forever off the shock that registered across Noah’s face when she told him she’d been accepted at Wellesley for undergrad. It was two years after she’d left Braintree in a blaze of glory; six months after she’d mailed off her application, her survival instinct kicking in even before she’d left LA; one month after she “lost” her phone and moved back east where the modeling agency’s long tentacles couldn’t reach her. She hadn’t made it in the movie business, but at least she’d made it out of it. And from the moment Wellesley said yes, Zanne had Noah’s attention in a way her sisters never did. He visited her on campus a couple times, and she wondered if this was how her mother felt when Noah had singled her out. Zanne hated herself for enjoying his attention. Later, at Harvard for grad school, she was determined to make better use of it. She had fantasies of being published in Classical Philology, simply because he read it, to defile its pages with punk scholarship. See how easy it is? she would say with her rhetorical flourishes and parenthetical doublespeak. All she wanted was for Noah to know that she thought his life’s work (work’s life?) was bullshit. How else to explain the speed with which she abandoned academia after his heart attack, when he was gone and there was no one left to rebel against?

Compartmentalization was her superpower. Turning feelings on. Turning them off.

She wasn’t a bleeding heart like Gaby, integrated, authentic, fueled by compassion.

Zanne had had a lifetime of practice at seeming to care. So, no, she didn’t know if Holly was okay.

“She misses the kids,” Zanne said to Erin, “and Ted didn’t want to have lunch with her. She got her feelings hurt, but she’ll bounce back.”

“But what if it’s the ad? She’s so private and people are saying such terrible things. She must be freaking out. Nobody’s made the connection yet between the Hollywood Couple and them. But I’m sure Holly’s terrified they will.”

“Why do we think she even saw it? She’s not exactly a whiz at social media.”

Erin looked down. Her face went bright red. “I showed it to her before she left for the marina. I didn’t want her to be caught off guard in case anyone brought it up. The Henrys. Kathy Jahan. Serafina Clark. Holly laughed it off, but—”

“Okay. Let’s not panic. She’s a grown woman.”

Erin looked at Zanne doubtfully.

Zanne found a turquoise silk maxi dress. She held out the skirt, turning it this way and that. “It’s nice, right?”

“Very pretty,” Erin said, pushing her glasses back in place. “Holly wore it in Mallorca a few years ago. Nobody at the party will have seen it.”

“Except Ted.”

“He won’t remember.”