I follow her to a red picnic table under a red and white awning. When it comes to businesses that use entirely too much red, I wonder which came first, The Cherry Pit or River Depot. Emma sets a foil-wrapped log in front of me, and opens hers. She takes a giant bite and makes a satisfied noise. “There is something so amazing about cherries in chicken salad.”

I eye the silver roll in front of me. “Do they make anything here that doesn’t have cherries in it?”

She stops chewing to think for a second. “The potato salad,” she says with a smile, then gets serious. “Have you talked to your mom yet?”

I let out a little grunt. “Not yet. I had a revelation today though. After the reporter ambush.” I texted Emma on my bathroom break after Aiden and I returned from our canoe trip. She got the short version, which included my mom’s stroke of luck and the reporter ambush, but I sort of glossed over everything else.

“Spill.” She makes a little waving motion with her hand. “And quickly, because I have the world’s shortest break.”

“You’ll love this, actually.” I start to unwrap the sandwich, but I’m not actually hungry, even though I missed lunch and it’s close to dinner. Which is very unlike me. “I decided that since playing things fast and loose has worked so well for my mother recently, I’m going to do the same.”

“You’re going to ditch your kid to find yourself?”

I roll my eyes. “I’m not going to stress this summer. I’m going to let fate make all of my decisions.” I reach into my purse and pull out two glossy red dice. “For example … evens, I text Ellis back and tell him I’ll hang out with my new coworkers tonight—”

“Definitely un-Olivia-like,” Emma says around a giant bite of sandwich.

“Odds, I get to stay home and recover from my first—and probably only—paparazzi incident.”

“Damn paps,” Emma mutters. “But they did get you alone in a canoe with Aiden Emerson, so…”

Ignoring her attempt to goad me into talking about Aiden, I shake the cubes in my hands and let them drop on the table.

Emma looks at the dice and laughs. “Oh man, I love this idea so much.”

I groan. “You would.”

“I actually just had an amazing idea.” Emma’s eyes light up and I’m not sure I want to know what has her looking so excited. “This is your essay.”

“What?”

“Write about your summer of taking chances. How letting fate decide made you less uptight and got you over the breakup of your one true love—” Emma rolls her eyes, but she’s smiling.

“I’m not uptight.”

“Like when someone starts running a mile every day, or stops eating meat, or something, and then writes about how it changed their outlook on life, or whatever…”