“Wherewereyou guys?” she hisses at them.
“We went over and sat on your stoop for a few minutes. To talk,” says David.
“Onmystoop?”
“Sorry, we didn’t think you’d mind.” This is Juliana. It’s not lost on Nicola that it’s more David’s stoop than it is hers. It’s actually Taylor’s stoop, so to David it’s a stoop-by-marriage. Something in her smarts at this realization. Even if she did mind, she’s not allowed to.
“Of course I don’t mind,” snaps Nicola.
The mood of the night is pulling Nicola down. Jack not answering the texts. Taylor showing her vulnerable side. Nicola herself, wondering what kind of a hand she’s had in someone else’s madness. “Of course I don’t mind,” Nicola says again, untruthfully. “Sit wherever you want. My stoop, your stoop. But David, Taylor is looking for you. She’s over there, sitting down.” She points. “I told her I’d send you over. And I’m calling it a night. Thank you, Juliana.”Thank you for inviting me to your weird party.“Good night, all.”
“Well, I guess this is good night, then,” says David. Nicola looks away—if there’s physical contact between Juliana and David, or even a smoldering glance, she doesn’t want to see it, not after her conversation with Taylor.
When David is gone, Juliana looks to Nicola, stricken. “Oh! I was hoping you’d stay until the end with me!”
“The... like the very end?”
“Please. Please. It won’t be much longer. Please please?”
Nicola sighs. She’s never been able to resist a doubleplease. “Fine,” she says. “Okay.”
Juliana’s right; it isn’t much longer. Nicola finds a corner to study her phone to see if Jack has texted (no). By then the music has stopped and the DJ is packing up and the bartender is racking the glasses, and in no time at all everybody is gone except for Juliana, and except for Nicola. Juliana motions Nicola to follow her into the kitchen. The caterers have made short work of everything there, leaving the lights turned low. Juliana switches on the pendant lights above the island and motions for Nicola to sit in one of the upholstered stools pulled up to the island. Upholstered stools! In a kitchen! Nicola’s mother, Linda, who every ten years or so replaces their kitchen stools with a new set from the store—a discount on top of a discount—would have been shocked by this. Food and upholstery, her mother would say, do not belong in the same room. They barely belong in the same house.
The cabinets are gray, and the island is a grayer gray (gray is the new white, supposes Nicola) and the countertops are gleaming white marble. Juliana pours them each a tall glass of water, which Nicola needs desperately, then sits at the far end of the island.
Juliana says, “I don’t think he liked the party.”
“Who?” Of course she knows who.
“David. He looked miserable. I thought if he came here during one of the... I thought if he saw... I thought.” She takes a deep breath, lets it out.
“You thought what?”
Juliana looks thoughtful. She taps her fingertips on the island top and sucks in her bottom lip. “I don’t know. Who knows. Who knows about anything.” Then she says, “Nicola, do you want to stay up with me?”
“Iamstaying up with you.” Nicola gestures to herself, then to the water glasses, the kitchen as a whole, Juliana.
“I mean all night. Do you want to stay up all night? We could watch a movie. I could make popcorn! We could watch the sunrise. What kind of movies do you like?”
“I can’t. I have to go to sleep. I’m falling over.”
Juliana doesn’t acknowledge this. “Do you think you can get me invited to dinner?”
“To dinner?”
“At David’s house.” Nicola stares at her, trying to find the best, most polite way to say,Are you out of your freaking mind?“I’m ready to make plans...”
“Plans?”
“For the future. Future plans.”
“For... what future?”
“For mine and David’s,” she says. “Forourfuture, Nicola. David is ready too. We talked about it tonight.” She goes on, “As soon as the IPO is done.”
“Oh, Juliana,” says Nicola.
“What?”
