Follow Me(4)

Her words hit me like a fist in the chest. Over the course of our decades-long friendship, Izzy and I had fought infrequently, and never about money. I had no idea she was harboring resentment for covering a few rent payments years ago. I’d long ago paid her back, and it wasn’t like I didn’t fork out my share these days. Besides, she never objected to accepting the sheet masks, adaptogens, and slow fashion items I got from brands courting me to promote them on Instagram.

“Whatever,” I sniffed, picking up the Prosecco. “I’m moving to DC anyway.”

Izzy blinked, surprised. “You got the job?”

“Yep,” I said, unwrapping the foil around the bottle’s top.

Not too long ago, Izzy would have demanded to know all the details, would not have relented until she’d heard my conversation with Ayala recounted in excruciating detail. She would have stayed up all night with me, discussing the pros and cons of taking the job, thoughtfully helping me reach the right decision. Now, she merely nodded.

“Oh. Well. I guess this will all work out then.”

“Yeah,” I snarled, popping the cork and taking a swig. “Everything’s going to be just fine.”

And it would be. Better things awaited me in DC. That much was finally clear.





CHAPTER TWO





CAT


Every Saturday, I ran my hand along the rows of nail polish displayed on the salon wall, lingering on shades of cherry and coral and fuchsia. And every Saturday, I selected the same pale pink I’d been wearing for the last four years.

“Live a little!” Monet, my favorite manicurist, implored. “Go for something with a little pizzazz!”

“Maybe next week,” I said, knowing I would not. “I have an important client meeting on Monday.”

“You always have a client meeting,” she clucked as she began removing the chipped remnants of last week’s polish.

That wasn’t strictly accurate but it was close enough. If I wasn’t meeting with a client, I was seeing opposing counsel, having lunch with a partner, or accompanying a more senior associate to court. I needed to command respect, and I couldn’t do that with “Showgirl Red” on my fingertips.

Monet nodded at my phone as it balanced faceup on the arm of the chair. “Must be an important client.”

My phone usually stayed in my purse at the salon. My weekly manicure was one of the few bits of time I carved out for myself, and it was the only time I turned off my ringer. For a glorious forty-five minutes on Saturday afternoons, I was unreachable. Client emails had to wait; partner requests for more research were put on hold.

I had been using manicures for stress relief since freshman year of college, when Audrey first got me hooked on them. She’d found me in the library, unshowered and unraveling into a pile of textbooks. She’d grabbed me by the hand and physically dragged me to the nail salon, despite my protesting the whole way. I told her I didn’t have the time for a break, that manicures were a waste of money. She just laughed like she knew better. And she did. There was something inherently soothing in having someone else gently shape and lacquer your nails. I was an immediate convert. Maybe now that Audrey was moving to DC, she and I would start going together again. I wouldn’t mind sacrificing my weekly forty-five minutes of personal time for Audrey time.

After all, Audrey had once been my closest friend even though now it had been at least a year or two since we had seen each other. Audrey and I had lived together in college, but after graduation seven years ago, she had moved to New York to live the glamorous life of her dreams and I moved to Virginia for law school. As many college friends do, we went from sharing secrets and Diet Cokes daily to catching up at the occasional wedding festivity or baby shower. I missed her. Audrey wasn’t a perfect friend, but she was the best one I’d ever had.

I could still remember, with brilliant clarity, the day we met. It was the first day of college, and I had been hopeful things would finally be different. After all, I was different. I had shot up in height since that disastrous summer at camp, and counseling and medication had nearly eradicated my stutter. I was no longer the girl Emily Snow had called “freak.” My fantasies about college being tolerable were shattered when I met my roommate, a snub-nosed brunette who introduced herself as “Tiffani with an i” and regarded me with barely concealed disdain. When our floor assembled for a meeting that afternoon, Tiffani pretended not to know me, and I resigned myself to being at the mercy of mean girls for another four years. I took a place on the floor, sipped a Coke, and tried not to cry.

When Audrey sauntered in, a bit fashionably late, everyone turned. With her shiny, red-gold hair and her infectious laugh, she was impossible to ignore. She was flanked by a pair of thin blonde girls, all three of them in denim cutoffs so short the pockets were visible, and as she sat down, she said something to the blondes that made them cackle like hyenas. I was captivated. Throughout the meeting, I watched Audrey from underneath my eyelashes, wondering what it would be like to make my way through the world so self-assuredly. She never so much as glanced in my direction.

But when Tiffani (purposefully, I think) kicked over my can of soda on her way out the door, it was Audrey who materialized by my side with a wad of paper towels.

“Here,” she said, handing a few to me and dropping the rest to the floor, using her sandaled foot to wipe up the mess.