Debbie swats her hand. “We sound like a pack of catty teenagers.”

“I want to see if Anna looks happy,” Becky says. “I want to see if she has that glow.”

“Imagine,” Wendy says. “Anna, happy.”

Ellen wasn’t wrong; Indigo is a unique experience with its own set of rules and a robust social conscience—which must be why Louisa picked it (Baker assumes that Louisa picked it, since what Debbie said is true—Anna eats only pizza). There are only thirteen seats at a horseshoe-shaped bar, making for a communal experience, which Baker figures is both good and bad. On the one hand, things can’t possibly get too ugly in such a controlled environment, but on the other, their civil discussion of arrangements might become a group-therapy session. They are, blessedly, placed at the far side of the horseshoe with Baker agreeing to take the seat on the end, in a relatively dim corner. Louisa is next to him, Anna on the other side of Louisa. This feels weird and wrong—shouldn’t he be sitting next to Anna so they can talk about Floyd? And yet, it’s also symbolic; Louisa is, in fact, the person who came between Baker and Anna, as the seating now illustrates.

They’re asked to select their tasting menu; they can choose carnivore, omnivore, or pescatarian-chordate.

Pescatarian means fish, Baker knows. He hasn’t a clue about chordate, but listed underneath is the word amphibian, which probably means frogs’ legs, but it’s too risky to chance it. Baker chooses carnivore with a first course called Turtlenecks and Do-Rags, and the ladies—women!—choose omnivore and will enjoy a first course called Descendants of Igbo, which is apparently yams with marshmallows.

This place is truly an alternate universe, but at least it serves as a distraction.

Anna, not one for small talk, leans forward and says, “Louisa was offered a position in the neonatal cardiothoracic surgery department at the Cleveland Clinic and she’s going to take it, and she persuaded them that two heart surgeons are better than one, so they’ve offered me a job as well.”

“Turns out, they’re even more excited to get the great Anna Schaffer than they are to get me,” Louisa says, and she covers Anna’s hand with her own.

Baker gazes at the two of them. They seem like strangers to him, like people he’s met at jury duty. Anna is wearing her hair down and it looks lovely, like a dark velvet curtain. Louisa’s hair used to be dark and long like Anna’s—Baker has known her long enough to remember this—but now she has cut it very short and dyed it platinum blond. They’re both glowing; they’re both happy. It’s obvious that they’re in love, that they’re a couple. None of the other ten diners tonight would ever guess that Baker and Anna are the people who are married.

Immediately after making this observation, he processes the words Cleveland Clinic. They’re both taking positions at the Cleveland Clinic, which, if Baker isn’t mistaken, is in Cleveland.