Now, at the beach, with Sherri, Rebecca said, “It’s been really hard on Morgan. She and Peter were very close. She’s done some funny things since Peter died. She’s become really klutzy, tripping over everything. She wet her sleeping bag at a sleepover! She’s never wet the bed, ever, not even when she was toilet training. And everybody found out about it.” It had been Gina’s house where it happened, almost a year ago now. It had been Gina who had whisked the sleeping bag away to be washed. “So naturally she doesn’t go to big sleepovers anymore.”

“Oh, that’s awful,” said Sherri.

Morgan and Katie were at the edge of the water taking turns doing handstands, probably videoing for Instagram. Katie’s handstands were solid but Morgan kept toppling over.

Two skinny teenage boys, hairless as hippos, were throwing a Frisbee back and forth. Many of the empty spots in the beach had filled in. Colorful umbrellas and their fancier cousins, pop-up beach tents, now occupied nearly every available space. The sand was shimmering with the heat. “Anyway, I’m so happy to see Morgan like this, making a new friend. Playing. She’s still a kid, and I want her to act like a kid.” She paused. “It’s an entirely different story with my older daughter, Alexa. She has a different father.” She paused and reached for a bottle of sunblock and squirted some out, rubbing it on her arms. “So in this funny way her grief is more, I don’t know, complicated than Morgan’s. Less clear-cut. I feel like there’s a wall between her and Morgan that wasn’t there before. Maybe it got too high before I noticed it, I don’t know. I don’t know how to break it down.” She paused again and then realized she’d just spilled at least three-quarters of her life story to a virtual stranger. “I’m sorry! I haven’t talked about most of this with anyone. I guess I had a lot saved up. Am I getting too personal, for a first date?”

“No!” said Sherri. “Not at all. I’m happy to lend an ear. Two ears!”

“Thank you,” said Rebecca. “It’s good to acknowledge some of this stuff out loud.”

One of the skinny Frisbee boys missed a catch and the Frisbee sailed perilously close to Sherri, effectively ending the serious part of the conversation.

“Is there any chance Alexa babysits?” Sherri asked, after tossing the Frisbee back toward the boy.

“Are you looking for a sitter for Katie?” asked Rebecca. (Could an eleven-year-old not stay alone? Eleven-year-olds were permitted to take the babysitting class at the Y and babysit for other people’s children!)