“Does that seem right to you?” Josie says, lifting her gaze to meet mine. “Taking some tropical vacation—”
I cut her off before she can really get rolling on her rant and say, “I don’t think it’s a question of right and wrong. And I didn’t say tropical or vacation. She mentioned New York, actually.”
“Why New York?”
“Because of Sophie.”
“Sophie who?”
“C’mon, Josie…you know who….Daniel’s Sophie.”
She shakes her head and says, “It’s weird that she still thinks about her. It’s unhealthy.”
“Maybe,” I say. “Maybe that’s why she wants to visit. To get closure.”
“Closure? Daniel died fifteen years ago, Meredith,” she says, her gaze steely.
“I know that,” I say.
She stares at me a beat before replying. “And you know what else?” Before I can answer, she continues, “They would have broken up. She would have broken his heart—or vice versa. And in either event, Mom would have hated her and held a grudge the way she does with all of our exes, and she would have long forgotten Sophie by now. And instead—”
“Instead Daniel died,” I say, thinking that that sums it all up, really. Daniel died and that changed everything, forever. And that is the part Josie always seems to be missing.
Josie’s face goes blank before she announces that she’s going to talk to Harper.
I sigh and watch her walk out of the room. Seconds later, I hear her and Harper squealing with laughter, corroborating one of two theories I’ve always had about my sister. That either (a) she uses children to hide her real adult emotions, or (b) she is still a child herself.
Thirty minutes of gaiety later, Josie returns to the kitchen with Harper in tow. She retrieves her shoes and says, “All right. It’s been real. But I’m out.”
“Where’re you headed?” I ask, though I’m really not all that interested.
“I’m meeting Gabe for dinner,” she says, tossing her empty beer bottle into the recycling bin.
“Don’t you see him enough as your roommate?” I ask, wondering when that situation will finally implode. No matter what they say, I firmly believe that men and women can’t be “just friends,” at least not when they’re cohabiting.
“You’d be surprised. We both have very busy social lives,” she says. “That’s what happens when you have friends.”
She’s directing the statement at me, having always believed in quantity over quality of friendships. The more photos you post with the more people in them means, of course, that you are having more fun. She is a thirty-seven-year-old woman who has never outgrown the concept of popularity. “Right,” I say. “Well, have fun.”
“I will. Thanks,” she says, throwing her tote over her shoulder. Meanwhile, Harper pulls on her arm and begs her not to go. I can’t help feeling irritated, noting that my daughter never objects to my departure quite so vehemently. Then again, it’s a little bit harder to be a mother than it is to roll in and play the fun aunt for an hour here and there.
“I have to go, sweetie,” Josie says, kneeling down to kiss Harper’s cheek before standing and making her way to the foyer.
“Bye, Josie,” I say, suddenly and bizarrely wishing she weren’t leaving. That it were the two of us headed to dinner together.
“See ya,” she says, without looking up from her phone as she heads out the door and down the front path.
I watch her for a few seconds, then call out her name. She turns back to look at me, her long blond hair blowing across her face.
“Yeah?”
“Will you at least think about what we discussed?” I say. “Please?”
“Oh, yeah. Sure thing,” she says in a flippant way that makes it clear she not only is lying but wants me to know she is lying. “I’ll get right on that.”
chapter three
JOSIE
“Perfect timing,” I say to Gabe as he joins me at the bar at Local Three, one of our regular hangouts. I point to the pan-roasted monkfish and chilled watermelon soup, which I bribed him with after he told me he was too tired to get off the sofa. A foodie verging on food evangelist, Gabe can always be motivated by his next meal, especially when I promise to pay—which I did tonight.
“What’d she do this time?” he asks. I haven’t yet given him any details about our conversation, only that I needed him to reverse the “Meredith effect”—my shorthand for the mix of bad feelings my sister so often gives me.
“I’ll get to her in a second,” I say. “But first things first.”
I hand him my phone and watch him read the email I received just as I was parking.
From: Andrea Carlisle Sent: August 18