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I narrow my eyes at her. “I don’t know. Working, probably.”

“At night?” She laughs, and the sound makes me smile.

“No, but I’ll be tired from working.”

Maggie gives me a look over the rim of her glass before taking another sip.

“What?”

“You always say that.”

“Because I’m always tired after working. I get up at four-thirty in the morning.”

“So take a nap.”

I laugh and lean back in my chair. “Okay. Is this going somewhere?”

“A friend from work is having a party.”

“Ah.”

“And I’m going.”

“Have fun.”

The corner of her mouth pulls upward, but she doesn’t immediately respond. Instead, she reaches for one of the potatoes, examines it as if only just realizing how cold they’ve gotten, then drops it back onto the plate.

“I was thinking you could come with me.”

My hand stills around my beer.

“Oh.”

It’s not the party that surprises me. Maggie and I have been doing things together for months now, but they’ve all looked more or less like this: coffee, happy hour, the occasional dinner. Things we put on a calendar several days in advance and do alone, sitting across from each other while we carefully figure out what parts of our old friendship are still relevant.

This feels totally different.

A party means other people. It means walking into a room together. Being introduced as Maggie’s friend instead of sitting safely in our own little bubble where neither of us has to define what we are now.

Maggie shifts in her chair. “You don’t have to.”

“No, I know.”

“I just thought it might be fun.”

I look at her, and there is enough casualness in her expression that I can tell she’s trying not to make the invitation heavier than it needs to be.

That makes me want to say yes more than I did five seconds ago.

“What kind of party?”

“A Halloween party.”

“Thank you, Maggie. Very informative.”

She laughs. “I don’t know, Flora. A normal party. Costumes, drinks, probably too many people crammed into a living room that was designed for twelve.”

“Whose house is it?”