“Yeeeeep.”
“I need you to say a lot more than that.”
She laughs and sits back. “Okay, here’s the story. My strong, creative mom met my quiet, redheaded dad in college, and they fell in love and had me.” She frames her face with her hands, warm brown skin kissed by the sun and dotted with freckles, tight long auburn-tinted curls draping over her shoulders. I’ve only seen her hair in braids, so I love getting to witness it natural now.
She blinks a million cute times. “In her words, she moved with him to his hometown in North Carolina and really tried her best to find happiness there. But she was so restless and needed more out of life—while my dad was utterly content, never wanting to move. She tried to make it work and opened her own restaurant there in town, which is the one you’ve probably heard about that launched her career. But in the end, it wasn’t enough. She wasn’t happy there. So they split about fifteen years ago—pretty amicably—and Mom moved here to New York. She worked her way up in the culinary world and eventually reopened her restaurant, but here in New York.”
“And now it’s thriving,” I say, in awe of this history. I’d forgotten that Zora never went to culinary school—a fact that makes her story even more impressive.
Josie smiles, and it’s clear she has a lot of love for her mom. “Itreally is. I lived with my mom full time in high school and visited my dad on the weekends now and then. Mom made me fall in love with cooking—and New York too.”
I lean my elbows on the table. “But you didn’t want to work in her kitchen?”
Josie removes an elastic band from her wrist and tugs her curls away from her face, wrapping them in a low, loose bun. “My mom and I are best friends, which is why I could never work with her. We’d kill each other.”
I can understand the sentiment, but as someone who’s lost her mom and feels an acute stab of longing to spend even one more minute with her, it’s hard not to correct Josie. To tell her to soak up every chance she gets—especially if they have a good relationship.
But as someone who’s lived with grief for more years than without it, I’ve learned that projecting it onto someone else isn’t helpful. Better to text my siblings later and commiserate.
“Plus, you didn’t need to work with her. You were so great in school and had all those awesome options right out of graduation, right?”
“Stop!” she says with a laugh, smacking her palms flat on the table. “We really know less about each other than I thought. Madison,” she whines my name, “I was so bad at school.”
“No.” I shake my head, unwilling to believe what I’m hearing. “You were the golden student. All the teachers loved you. You had so many interviews right after graduation!”
“Because of my mom!”
“But you just said—”
“I wanted to do it without her name. I never said Idid,though.” She scrunches her nose. “About two weeks in, I realized I wasn’t the natural I thought I’d be—so I started name-dropping to get better treatment. And it absolutely worked. Lady, it’s a miracle I made it through school.” She gives me jazz hands. “Nepo baby allthe way!” Then she pops a fry. “It’s really great. You should try it sometime.”
“I would, but my parents are dead, so I can’t.” I toss out that little gem as the true test of whether we’re compatible friends or not.
Josie pauses, mid-fry-to-mouth. Then she coughs a laugh. “Okay, you win the sympathy award! Dead parents get it every time.”
I smile, thrilled by this response. “I could start dropping your mom’s name after tomorrow though. Nepotism by association?”
“Perfect! Okay, but quick, before he comes back . . . what’s the deal with James?” She hunches over the table to say this quietly, amber eyes sparkling. “Is he single?”
My gut twists. “Why are you asking? Do you want his number?”
She rockets back against the bench and points at me. Josie and her demonstrative actions somehow make me look tame. “Look at your face! No way would I get in the middle of all that.”
“There’s no face. He’s just my friend.”
Her finger twirls in the air in front of my nose. “So muchface. Do you love him? Are you two sleeping together? And why are his hands so big? My god, maybe Iamchanging my mind. I think I do want his number.”
I fold my arms. “You can’t have it.”
“Because you love your friend?”
I don’t answer. Just stare a hole through Josie’s face as James returns to the table. She raises and lowers her eyebrows.
“I like her,” James says as soon as we leave the restaurant.
“I do too. I wish I’d spent more time with her while I was here.”
James abruptly stops walking. I turn and see he’s fallen a few steps behind. “What’s wrong?”
