“Seriously.” Everly—ever the health nut—rakes a plastic fork through her quinoa salad. “Last time I pay fifteen bucks for a tiny container of grains.”
Molly raises an eyebrow. “Please, Ev. Dumbo is the capital of overpriced salads.”
“Yeah, and they actually taste good!”
“Ugh, you guys.” Molly laughs, despite herself. “Thanks for coming all the way out here. You’re saints.”
“You act like we made some epic journey.” Nina crosses her legs.
“Yeah, Flynn Cove is only an hour drive, Moll. That’s basically as long as it takes me to get to Nina’s, now that she and Michael live on the Upper East Side.” Everly makes a face, and Molly laughs again.
“Don’t knock it, Ev. There’s a gay bar around the corner from our apartment.”
Everly rolls her eyes. “I would love to see the crowd that place draws. The closeted homosexuals of Park Avenue.”
Nina giggles, conceding. “You’re right. I totally miss Brooklyn.”
“Not as much as I miss Brooklyn.” Molly sighs wistfully. Over Everly’s shoulder, she spots Betsy Worthington ordering at the counter. Betsy wears tennis whites, her limbs deeply tanned, her chestnut ponytail swinging. They make eye contact, and Molly gives a small wave. Betsy frowns, pretends not to see her, then turns back to the register.
“What’s up her butt?” Nina whispers, observing the interaction.
Molly waits till Betsy retrieves her iced coffee and is headed toward the exit.
“That woman hasn’t spoken to me since we showed up to the country club fireworks wearing the same dress.”
Everly laughs so loud the barista looks over. “Sorry,” she says, tucking a blond lock behind her ear. “I was momentarily transported back to seventh grade.”
“God.” An incredulous expression crosses Nina’s face. “No wonder you want to stay friends with Jake’s wife. The women in this town seem brutal. Sabrina actually sounds normal.”
“Yeah, Sabrina really is so great.” But all of a sudden, it hits Molly: she hasn’t seen or heard from Sabrina in nearly ten days. They haven’t spoken since before she met up with Jake at Skipping Beach. Her stomach flips. How is that possible?
Nina studies her. “You okay?”
“I just—hang on.” Molly digs her phone out of her purse, scrolls through her messages. Her last text to Sabrina is outgoing, sent Sunday morning. Dinner at Dune next week? I’m craving their calamari.
Molly remembers sending the text. It was a few hours before her walk with Jake, and she’d been harboring guilt over the fact that she hadn’t said anything to Sabrina about their plans. She didn’t want to make a big deal of it. Molly had hoped they could have dinner in the next few days so that she could casually mention how she and Jake had caught up in person, emphasize how platonic it had been.
But, of course, it hadn’t been platonic at all, and in the days that followed, Molly had been too absorbed in her own emotional shitstorm—Jake, Hunter, the embryo that may or may not have implanted inside her—to remember that Sabrina had never answered her text.
“That’s weird.” Molly placed her phone down on the table, glancing from Nina to Everly. “I just realized I haven’t heard from Sabrina in a week and a half—which isn’t like her. She comes to at least one of my weekly classes at Yoga Tree. And she didn’t reply to my last text.”
Nina tilts her head in thought. “When’s the last you heard from her?”
“The day before the embryo transfer, she wished me good luck. So early last week.”
“Well, don’t jump to any conclusions. It doesn’t mean she knows about you and Jake. There’s no way he would’ve told her what happened.”
“Agreed.” Everly sips her matcha. “People just get busy in the summer, you know? Follow up with her.”
“I guess.” Molly shrugs. “God, living in this town has made me so self-conscious. I should really be worrying less about Sabrina and more about Hunter. And Stella. And the fact that I’ve fucked up my marriage.”
“Molly.” Nina squeezes her forearm. “Take a deep breath. Just slow it down, okay?”
Molly glances at her phone. “Shoot, it’s eleven thirty. I gotta go.” She groans. She wants nothing more than to stay in the comforting cocoon of her closest friends, but she has to be at Yoga Tree to teach the noon Vinyasa flow.
The three of them hug goodbye on the sidewalk outside Gwen’s.