Page 184 of Rising Heat

“This place is adorable,” Bex says, shrugging off her jacket.

“I figured you’d like it.”

The hostess leads us through the dining room and out onto a little greenhouse terrace where sunlight pours through the glass ceiling, warming the little corner table she points us toward.

Bex reaches for her menu.

“What’s good?”

“I’ve only been here once.”

“So we’re gambling.”

“I’ve never led you astray.”

She looks up over the menu.

“You once convinced me escargot was basically garlic bread.”

“…The taste is practically the same.”

“It was a snail, Darcy.”

“I knew I shouldn’t have told you what it actually was.”

She shakes her head, smiling to herself.

“I’ll trust you anyway.”

Twenty minutes later there’s a pitcher of mimosas between us, a crab cake Benedict in front of me, avocado toast in front of Bex, and somehow she’s already stolen half my breakfast.

“You ordered avocado toast.”

“I wanted to try yours.”

“Then why didn’t you order mine?”

“Because I wanted avocado toast, too.”

I stare at her as she steals another bite, shimmying her shoulders as she clearly enjoys both of our meals for us. I slide my plate the rest of the way across the table and reach for the other half of her avocado toast instead.

She beams like she’d accomplished something.

For a while the conversation goes exactly where it always has.

Our latest binge reads. Work and Bex’s exhausting managing editor. The dating scene she’d pretty much given up on back in Philly. Our parents. The familiar rhythms of home that somehow kept moving without me there to notice.

“You remember sophomore year when we swore we’d get an apartment together after college?”

“We were going to split rent.”

“We thought rent was, like, eight hundred dollars for a two bedroom in Rittenhouse Square.”

“We also thought we’d get a puppy.”

“Two.”

“And a record player.”