Eighty

EIGHTY

WORKING TOO HARD ON Rob Jacobson's case makes the days start to feel longer and longer. I'm exercising too little, not eating as healthy as Dr. Sam Wylie wants me to.

Sam invites me to dinner, just the two of us, midweek, at the Bell & Anchor, on Noyac Road in Sag Harbor.

Good food, good pours, good vibe. On top of that, I'm here tonight with my good friend.

When we've been served our white wines, Sam says, "You look tired."

"What every girl wants to hear," I say. "But I promise: It's a good tired."

Then I raise my glass and she does the same.

"You sound like those people from Arizona who say, well, yeah, but it's a dry heat," Sam says.

"I promise I'm doing all the right things you've told me to do," I tell her. "You'd be proud of me."

We're both wearing blue summer dresses. Sam's navy one fits her much better than mine, in a lighter shade, fits me.

"I'm proud of you," she says softly.

I proceed to catch her up on crazy-town recent events. What most interests her is how Martin showed up like a lump on my doorstep.

"Promise you didn't give him a good kick?" she asks.

"Like I told you. I thought really, really hard about it."

She has never liked him, never trusted him. She told me after Martin and I broke up that he was a phony who had probably been cheating on me all along, unless he was incredibly unlucky to have gotten caught the one time that he did.

"I'd like to kick that French bastard," Sam Wylie says. "Right in the bon bons."

I redirect the conversation, asking about her husband, her kids, her annoying dogs.

"They're not annoying. They're adorable."

"You know what they are? They're the dog version of avocados."

"Wait… what ?"

"Hear me out," I say. "All of a sudden, without anybody noticing, avocados got way too popular."

She grins but knows enough to let me go.

"Labradoodles didn't even used to be a thing," I continue. "Are you aware that they didn't even become an official breed until 1989?"

"You actually researched my dogs ?"

"You think I'd come out to dinner with you unprepared?" I ask.

I laugh. She laughs. She really does look fabulous tonight. But then she always has, even back in junior high, when every girl we knew seemed to go through an awkward phase except her. Put it another way: nobody has ever accused Samantha Callaghan Wylie of being more boy than girl.

If they had, I would have punched out their lights, too.

I get around to telling her about trying and failing repeatedly, almost spectacularly, to break up with Dr. Ben.

"Well," she says, raising her glass, "I'll drink to that."

"Because I'm still with him?"

"Hell, no," she says. "Because you finally lost a case."

We stretch dinner over a couple of hours. We try to keep the conversation as light as possible, as we've both decided in advance that this evening will be a no-cry zone.

I tell Sam that I'm too full for dessert. She tells me that in her considered medical opinion, I need more food. So she orders us the Bell & Anchor's Dreamy Brownie Sundae.

Two spoons.

"You're too thin," she says.

"Look who's talking."

We laugh again. The waiter brings the dreamy dessert. We both order decaf coffee. It's clear that neither of us wants this night to end. Both of us feeling young. Martin talked about furloughing some of his employees during COVID. Tonight I feel as if I'm on furlough from real life.

Sam finally gets up and heads for the ladies' room. While she's away, I scan a room whose lights have dimmed by now, spot a corner table in the darkest corner of the place, getting a good view of it when the waiter steps away.

And despite my distance from the table, I am quite certain and quite aware that I am looking at Edmund McKenzie and Eric Jacobson, deep in conversation.

When Sam sits back down and sees my face she says, "What?"

"I think I just saw somebody I know. Two somebodies, actually. Or nobodies, depending on your point of view."

I tell her who they are and why it matters to me that they are here together.

"Be right back," I say, and get up from the table.

I've only taken a couple of steps toward them when the main dining room at the Bell & Anchor begins to spin.

I take one more step, and then stop, unable to do anything now except wait for the world to stop spinning.

Something it refuses to do.

I take a small step to the side, all weight on my right foot, as a way of trying to steady myself, remembering times in the gym when the trainer would make me balance on one foot for thirty seconds.

I bump into a waiter then.

Someone grabs for my arm.

Too late.

I'm falling.

I hear a woman scream.

Last thing I remember.