“When I was going out with Holden, I lived in fear that Drew would be at the house,” I remembered aloud. “All he did was tease us about hooking up. He’d shout from wherever he was, ‘Hey, are you kids making out up there? Smoochy-smooch! Kissy-kissy!’ And it was like he knew how much I hated that term, making out.” I grimaced.

  “Yeah, it’s hard to believe he’s any better. I say we stay for an hour. Jake wants to meet up at Floyd after. He’s playing bocce there with some friends.”

  “And God forbid you and Jake go three hours without seeing each other.”

  “He makes me laugh.”

  “He makes you more than laugh.”

  “I know.… ” Smarty smiled to herself. She’d been in a permanent Hollywood-musical mood since Halloween—nothing but smiles and a spring in her step, and it had everything to do with Jake Weinstock. In the halls, they were inseparable. If she wasn’t texting him, she was waiting for his text to come in. All conversations seemed to lead down the path to Jake’s name, and most after-school or weekend plans included him.

  Which was fine by me.

  She was intolerable, before. Calling me, texting me every hour to talk about Holden and insisting he and I give it another chance. I was just about ready to kill her.

  The thoughts came unbidden and surprised me.

  “Sometimes I wish I’d met Jake last year; then maybe I wouldn’t have been so, I don’t know, invested—while you and Hold went through your breakup.” Rachel spoke as if she’d been reading my mind. “When I think about it, I wonder if I just ended up making all your crap worse.”

  “No way. You can’t take responsibility for that.”

  “I know. But anyway, I think it’s cool that you’re giving it another try.”

  Another try? Is that what Holden had told her? This seemed like the perfect time for me to tell Smarty about Kai. To confess everything—our meetings, our connection, El Cielo, the fact that he whipped around in my head on a permanent spin cycle. I wanted to blurt out that I was walking on air today because I had a message from Kai on my phone, a message to pick him up this Saturday outside his dorm, the St. George, which was a few blocks from the Manhattan Bridge—and about a twenty-minute walk from my house.

  Since yesterday, I’d walked there twice in the hope I’d accidentally-on-purpose bump into him. So far, no luck. Of course, he was self-admittedly never there, since he was usually in class or working at El Cielo—which was one place where I didn’t want to drop by uninvited, no matter how much I wanted to connect with him. Not with his tía Isabella’s unflinching eyes on me. I’d be pushing my luck.

  But the moment of confession looped into another, less intimate one as Rachel and I walked on, our orchids occasionally tangling up with each other. Maybe Kai was still just a me thing. Maybe I just wasn’t ready to share.

  “This reminds me of that other time, do you remember?” asked Rachel. “Back when Holden hosted his junior class party, and we walked over to the Wildes’ together carrying that double-fudge cake your mom had picked up at Betty Bakery, and all the fondant roses on the sides got smushed? Remember?”

  “Kind of.”

  “And I was in my rebel smoking phase, and I had to hide my Parliaments in somebody’s flower box when Aunt Eleanor saw me puffing away from down the road. And oh my God, the actual party, how hilarious it was? All the guys just sweaty and miserable in their outgrown blazers, and Holden kept making fun of Aunt Eleanor because she was obsessed that the mini-burger buns might not be gluten-free since someone—I forget who it was in the class—couldn’t eat them, and she was scared of a lawsuit?” Rachel’s face was lit up into the past as she called it all back.

  “Emily Vaughn,” I said. “It was Emily because she’s got celiac disease, and Holden’s mom kept announcing it to everyone, and Emily kept saying, ‘No, it’s cool; I’m not even hungry,’ just to shut her up.”

  “Ha-ha, that’s right. And then we went into the city to bowl at Chelsea Piers after, remember? Which was awesome.”

  “Yeah.” I could see it vaguely. It had been such a nothing night, even the bowling. But Rachel loved Chelsea Piers and double-fudge cake from Betty. Funny how the exact same event could get folded up and put away in some people’s memories, while it got shaken out in others’, to be worn again and again.

  “Hey, listen,” said Rachel as we stood side by side at the Wildes’ front door. “If the family isn’t feeling too warm and fuzzy around you, I’m right here, okay? Don’t let ’em get you down.” Rachel knocked her hip against mine in solidarity, the orchids tangling a last time just as one of the uniformed caterers opened the door.

  Lilies, peonies, hyacinths—the front hall was banked in them. Immediately my eyes and nose started to itch. My pollen allergies were not going to be friends with this party. As Rachel and I set down our orchids, I sneezed discreetly into my sleeve. I looked around at the crowd, the open view of an equally formal dining room and what Holden’s mother always insisted on calling the “parlor.”

  I’d never liked this fussy house, and it set me on edge to be here again. And at Drew’s engagement party, no less. It was odd to think of Drew committing to something as selfless as falling in love, since he was always such a prick to everyone. Not a prick like Claude, who targeted his words like a sharpshooter and was always hoping for a reaction. Drew was tone-deaf; he moved through the world in rudeness and oblivion, hardly ever recognizing that his insults and oversights were painful to others.

  Across the antiques and coiffed heads in the Wildes’ parlor, I spied Holden talking to his grandparents, who’d come in from Summit, New Jersey, for the weekend. Holden’s eyes were also red-rimmed with allergic reaction; plus the beard was gone, and I suspected that his clean shave was the result of losing the argument to his mother. It disappointed me slightly that Holden hadn’t held his ground on that one.

  “Whoa, boy!” I crouched to accept Jolly’s waggling, nose-to-tail, full-on doggy-greeting at our unexpected reunion—and nearly fell over backward in the process.

  “The ewww factor just doubled,” whispered Rachel on my side as I stood. “Claude’s here. At least he’s with Lucia. She makes him less awful.”

  “How’d he get invited?” I asked as we all exchanged fake-friendly waves across the room.

  “Not him; her. Probably Aunt Eleanor heard that Lucia’s family’s got rocks.”

  “You know, even when Holden and I were going out, I always felt like Mrs. Wilde looked down on me,” I admitted. I’d never confessed that before—it had embarrassed me. But now it didn’t seem to matter.

  “How so?”

  “She just kept me at a distance. Like, for example, she never, ever let me call her Eleanor.”

  “Oh, because that’s such a privilege.” Rachel rolled her eyes. “First-name basis with the Wicked Witch of the Heights.” She nicked an endive leaf topped with something cream-cheesy from another passing caterer. “Hey, this reminds me,” she said as she crunched. “You know that every morning for breakfast Jake Weinstock eats a cream cheese and—”

  “Girls!” Like a tiny shark, Mrs. Wilde was plunging through the parlor, heading for us.

  “Annnd…here we go,” whispered Rachel.

  I put on my best game face as Mrs. Wilde pulled up at us with an air-kiss that barely made it within six inches of our heads. Her thin strawberry-blond hair was stiff-sprayed into what Rachel called the “party pumpkin,” and she was wearing a cashmere sweater set paired with a leopard skirt—Holden once had told me his mother thought an animal print cast a wide net of dress-code acceptability for whatever anyone else showed up in.

  “Aunt Eleanor, congrats. I can’t believe someone’s actually going to marry Drew.” Rachel said it in such a way that I knew it was hard for Mrs. Wilde to tell if she was kidding. Which of course she was not. I bit my bottom lip to stop my smile.

  “The house looks great, Mrs. Wilde,” I said.

  “Ah. Thank you, Ember. And you are looking…wonderful.” Mrs. Wilde was unapologetically checking me out. “Wonderful”—she trilled the word again—“that you’re here with us, Ember.”

  Here, as in here on earth, as a car accident survivor? Or here, as in ex-girlfriend with a possible second act? Or was Mrs. Wilde just being one hundred percent insincere as usual, and madly wishing that she hadn’t allowed Holden to invite me to her oldest son’s engagement party after all?

  It was so hard to gauge fake people.

  “Girls, please don’t whisper and giggle with each other all evening, all right? Try to mingle. It’d be such a help to me.” Mrs. Wilde flashed an oversized smile; her Botoxed forehead stayed indifferent. “Ember, my goodness! We must catch up once I finish the rounds.” And with a parting pat on my shoulder, she glided back into the crowd.

  “Promise me you will never let me turn into someone who ‘finishes the rounds,’ ” whispered Rachel once Mrs. Wilde was out of earshot.

  “Now, now. No whispering, no giggling.” I frowned. “Mingle, minion!”

  Which cracked us up all over again.

  The Wildes had stocked their party with the usual suspects, mostly soft-faced, parent-aged couples in woolly blazers and tortoiseshell glasses. Holden’s older brother, Drew, looked fancier in his pinstripes. When I saw him in the back of the dining room, chin up and ready to rumble, an unexpected unease washed through me. I’d never liked Drew, and I really didn’t like him now, pumped with pride over his engagement, which he probably just viewed as another milestone in his smug, accomplished life.

  As if sensing that eyes were on him, Drew glanced out. The heat in his stare, when he found me, made me want to run.

  “Ouch. Did you see that? Drew just threw you some mean shade,” Rachel whispered in my ear. “What’s the deal with his deal?”

  “You tell me,” I said carefully, distracting myself by kidnapping a crab cake from another passing tray.

  Rachel sighed. “Drew probably thinks you’re going to dump Holden again.”

  I swallowed. “How can I dump Holden again if we’re not going out?”

  “You know what I mean. Anyway, Drew’s a stuck-up conservative jerk, so maybe he’s just practicing his standard jerk glare. Isn’t it amazing how everyone finds exactly their person?” Rachel wagged her head in wonder. “I mean, Raina is the best fit for Drew. The girl is wearing a freaking Minnie Mouse polka-dot headband and has tiny bows on her shoes.”

  I studied Raina, slim and elegant at Drew’s side. I knew what Rachel meant, but I didn’t completely agree. “Maybe she’s dressing that way because she thinks people expect her to dress that way. I think there’s a much more fun, twinkly, non-corporate-lawyer version of Raina who is dying to get out and karaoke.”

  “She’ll be sad to learn Drew Wilde is one hundred percent twinkle-free.”

  “Then he can borrow her twinkle on Saturdays.” Was I imagining this, or had Drew just scowled at me again? Of course, he had one of those naturally inverted mouths that made it look like he was annoyed pretty much all the time.

  Still, I could feel my face go blotchy with embarrassment.

  Seemingly aware of my distress, Holden finally detached from his grandparents to join up with me. He threaded his arm loosely around my shoulders and bent for a quick cheek kiss. “You’re awesome to come to this. What can I get you to drink?”

  “Ginger ale?”

  “Strong stuff.” With a nod to Rachel, he added, “Let’s go.” I wondered if other people noticed Holden’s arm. In some ways, it was a confidence boost and made me feel like I belonged here. On the other hand, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to give Holden such bold arm-to-shoulder rights. On the other, other hand—I was probably giving this too many hands.

  “Are your parents okay with me being here?” I asked in his ear.

  “You’re sweet to care about what my parents think,” he answered. “I don’t.”

  “Clean-shaven liar. Of course you do.”

  Holden rubbed his chin. “Touché. But Mom’s too wrapped up in the party and Dad’s too wrapped around the bourbon.”

  “Holdie, fix me a Diet Coke with lime?” asked Rachel.

  “You got it.”

  Suddenly it struck me that this was how it would be if Holden and I got engaged. This would be our party, with Rachel bopping next to us, and Mrs. Wilde using the very same catering company and ordering up the same polleny flower arrangements. Holden’s sparrow-boned Wilde grandparents would be here from Summit, too, along with those quirky next-door neighbors, the Rossiters, who often dressed in matching safari-esque suits—and tonight was no exception. And then Mr. Wilde would drink too much, and Drew would scowl with his scar-thin mouth, and the entire event would be spread in sticky layers of politeness, and would go on way too long.

  “Light on ice, heavy on the ale, right?” Holden handed me a ginger ale with just two cubes and clinked his imported beer bottle with my glass. He looked super cute tonight. Even with the clean shave. Effortlessly adult—I practically could see him at age thirty. I imagined us dating on and off through college. It wasn’t so out-there; we were natural friends, always had been. We’d never exactly said “I love you” to each other, but still. I’d never felt unloving or unaffectionate with Holden. And there were times I could get stupidly weak-kneed, staring at the chiseled angles of his face. If Holden and I ever did get back together—a big if, but not stratospherically impossible—would we ever have enough reason to break up again?

  I felt the puff of Kai’s breath in the cold-storage room, the damp animal-shine of his eyes in the darkness, the way the side of his body had pressed mine, the rumble of his voice lulling me—

  “Ember!” Mrs. Wilde’s thin fingers had latched my wrist. “Let me introduce you to Raina.”

  “Perk up, dish-Raggedy Ann.” Rachel gave me a nudge, and Holden reluctantly relinquished me, as Mrs. Wilde led me to where Raina stood in front of the fireplace.

  “Raina, I wanted you to meet Ember. Who has been a special friend to Holden.” This was classic Mrs. Wilde—to take something awkward and make it way more awkward. Special friend? Seriously? “I think I told you about her horrible year?”

  “Yes. Of course.” Raina’s eyes widened. “What a thing to live through.”

  Up close, I didn’t mind what Smarty had been mocking. Raina’s polka-dot headband and super-feminine shoes seemed to suit her. Plus her eyes were gentle as a child’s. “My brother, Ian, was in a bus accident,” she confided, “and no matter what anyone said, I swear he was never the same after. Oh—but I didn’t mean it that way.” As Raina touched her shell-pink manicured fingers to her lips, I noticed her engagement ring, sparkling with new ownership. “I only meant that you…I mean, you look perfect to me.” She laughed apologetically. “Not a scratch on you.”

  “Oh, but I’ve got a couple of scratches,” I admitted. “Mostly on the inside.”

  Raina nodded. “Sometimes those are the hardest to heal. With my brother—”

  “Hey, Rain, I want you to meet some of my cousins.” Drew was at us like a wolverine in pinstripes.

  “Good to see you, too, Drew.” I cleared my throat. “Congratulations.”

  “Thanks, Ember.” He hardly looked at me. “Nice of you to come.” And then he patrolled Raina away by the elbow as if I were some kind of playground predator. I was relieved to join Smarty, who was now hanging out with Lucia, and, thankfully, no Claude.

  “Ciao, Ember,” Lucia greeted me in her lilting Italian—did she sound delightfully musical, I wondered, even when she got angry? “I’ve been meaning to tell you something. Remember when you asked me about that girl, Maisie, from my Halloween party? And I didn’t know her? Last week, I was speaking with my uncle on the phone, and I asked about her. He said Maisie has a partial art scholarship at the New School. A scholarship that he helps to fund.”

  “Oh, that’s cool.” I kept my tone casual. Lucia’s uncle probably knew Anthony, too. I wondered if he had come up in the conversation.

  Lucia shook her glossy hair dismissively. “He says she is not very serious about her art, not like some of the others.” When she got imperious, Lucia sounded kind of like Claude. She had slipped into his skin in some ways since they’d started dating, the way so many couples did. “Uncle Carlos also helped to discover Alice de Souza,” Lucia continued. “Do you know of her?”

  My heart leapfrogged. “Alice de Souza? Of course!” I’d just seen the piece in the arts section of last weekend’s newspaper, an article about this brilliant new young artist. The photograph had been one of those arty shots, and it had rung a distant bell, as I’d studied that image of a girl standing, speculative in her long spattered T-shirt, one foot planted on either side of a slab of linen canvas on the floor.

  I’d figured it was just one of those oddly indefinable déjà vu things, but Alice de Souza must have been Maisie’s friend Alice. The picture snapped like a rubber band in my head—Alice in the Cleopatra costume and gladiator sandals at the party was also the same Alice from that day last year, too—we’d been trooping through Tribeca and then we’d stopped by the apartment on North Moore Street, and Alice was egging us on, “Let’s go up, just for a minute,” and then we were spilling through those giant rooms, looking for Anthony’s painting.…

  On Rachel’s “Earth to Ember!” with accompanying finger flick, I was back.

  What was wrong with me? Second time tonight.

  I was still standing between Lucia and Rachel, but they weren’t looking at me. Everyone was listening to Holden’s dad give a toast. His arm swung his glass of champagne as he spoke, and his voice was reedy in his strain to amplify himself through the rooms. I fixed my attention. Mr. Wilde wasn’t as glammed-out as his wife; in fact, he looked more like a bath-toy version of Holden. Round, buoyant, and even a bit damp.

  “…and to be as happy as Eleanor and I have been these past thirty-four years. Marriage is the most important decision you can make. It takes work, it takes commitment, and it takes one incredibly important sentence: ‘Honey, you’re right.’ ”

  “He sure packs in the hammy clichés,” whispered Rachel.