Page 49 of The Magic We Made

“I changed my mind. How are you?”

“I’m good. No, I’mgreat.See that guy over there?”

I look in the direction she’s pointing, but there are so many people crowded onto the back deck, especially guys, I can’t tell who she’s talking about it. “Which one?”

“The one in the suit. He’s some cousin of Derrick’s from the city. He asked me to go apple picking with him tomorrow at Farmer Frank’s. Should I go?”

I still have no idea who she’s talking about but I say, “Yes,” anyway, because Rochelle hasn’t been on a date since the last fireman conference came to Connecticut.

“Good. I was hoping you’d say that. Guess I’m going apple picking tomorrow. But tonight—” She knocks back the rest of her champagne. “I’m going to get boned. See you later.”

I laugh as she heads off toward the cluster of men in suits, thinking she’s joking.

But she isn’t. She walks right up to a guy in a gray suit, grabs him by the lapels, and kisses him on the mouth. The guy looks pleasantly surprised while his friends hoot and cheer.

I’ve been to some crazy parties with Rochelle before, back in high school. She was always like this, so I’m not alarmed.

What does perturb me a little is how surprised everyone seems to be that I showed up. I didn’t realize my reputation as a Negative Nancy was so widespread.

But this truly is the first time since my divorce that I’ve bothered coming to a social event, let alone dressed up for one. I even have makeup on—Angie insisted, just like she insisted on covering my gray but giving me “just a few highlights around the face” to “brighten things up.”

The end result astonished even me.

“You came!” Dina shrieks when she sees me.

“Yeah.” I feel sheepish about my initial resistance. “Thanks so much for letting me come even though I RSVP’d no—”

“Don’t be silly.” Dina has her own superpower—I’ve seen it in action many times—keeping my family, especially my brother, in line. She doesn’t always manage it, but when she does, the results are spectacular—like now, when I see Mark out on the dance floor, showing our nieces and their friends how to do the Electric Slide. “You’ve had a rough year. But things are definitely looking up for you lately, aren’t they?”

I throw her a sharp glance. “What do you mean?”

She can’t possibly mean the fact that a highly attractive—if possibly neurodivergent—bachelor has moved in next door.

No, she doesn’t.

“I meanthis!” Dina plucks at the sleeve of the red dress. “You look amazing in it! And your hair—Angie did a great job.”

“Oh,” I say, relieved. “Yes, she did.”

“And I also heard you finally caught that cat that’s been living under your porch!” An attentive hostess, Dina sees that I have no drink, grabs flutes of champagne from a passing server, then hands one to me. “Congrats! You must be so happy!”

“Ha. Thanks.”

It’s nice to be sipping champagne in the sunshine at a party on a lovely deck overlooking a body of water. Even though I have a (much smaller) deck looking out over a lake back home, I never stand on it and drink champagne. I might need to change that.

“I haven’t had a chance to take her to the vet yet to check for a microchip,” I go on. When I’d left the house, Daisy had been perched on the back of my couch, gazing wistfully out the window at the front porch beneath which, only the day before, she’d been living.

Be a good girl, Daisy,I’d told her, still emphasizing her name.

I don’t think I’m anthropomorphizing when I say that the look she gave me in reply was so filled with reproachment, I almost apologized... to acatthat I’d rescued from the cold and certain starvation.

“So,” I go on, “I don’t know for sure if I—”

“Frankie!” Mark appears in front of us, sweaty and panting from all the dancing. “You made it! Shit, what happened to you? You look good for a change.”

I give him an icy smile. “Eat a bag of dicks, Mark.”

He makes a mock horrified face. “I’m telling Ma!”