I went home, intending to change clothes and call Grace one more time, but found a message waiting for me on my machine. “Hi, Jack,” said Grace’s voice, and I almost laughed with relief. “I’m sorry I haven’t called. I’ve been a mess. Oh, thank you for the flowers, they’re beautiful. Joker keeps trying to eat them, though, so they’re stuck on top of the fridge for now.” A pause, two starts and stops of her voice. “Um … I … we really need to talk. I can’t tonight, but can we meet tomorrow night? I can come up there if you want, since you’ve been coming down here so much; I feel bad about you having to always drive all that way. Let me know if that’s all right. Talk to you later. Bye.”

All the happiness I’d felt on the way back from Tiffany, the sheer joy at the thought of seeing her face when I gave her the ring, was sucked out of me. She’d sounded awful, and it wasn’t hard to read between the lines. No “I miss you” or “Can’t wait to see you.” This was a disaster. Everything was crumbling.

I sat down with the phone in my hand, trying to get myself to call her but not able to push the speed dial. I tried not to panic. Had I done something? Said something? Other than that night over dinner, I couldn’t recall ever having a conversation with Grace where I said something that set her off. I’d seen the latest Us and People magazines and knew I wasn’t in them, so it couldn’t be some wild accusation or rumor. Not that it would matter; we always laughed together over the ridiculous claims made by the gossip columnists, the way they misconstrued meetings of celebrities and their friendships and conversations and chance run-ins.