“Thank you, Samantha.” She looked at me while she nuzzled Utah. “Thank you so much, Samantha.”

Serious Holly again said, “Rosie’s blood pressure is off the charts. I have to get home.”

“Absolutely. We are going to get you there.”

“By hook or by crook,” Summer added.

I shifted positions slightly, not wanting to disturb Peanut. His body had conformed to mine, and Moose lay like a jockey across the larger dog’s back. Someone farted, and I stopped breathing through my nose.

Holly driving fed her need for control, and Summer navigated and chatted about being in an episode of Friends and how she and Lisa Kudrow were practically sisters. Holly was tense but quiet. I liked how Summer kept the mood in the car light, talking about a show Holly had rarely watched, and a sistership that had a 97.9 percent chance of being false.

I opened the window for some fresh air, and the noise alerted Summer.

“Hey, girl. How you doin’?” This in her best Joey impersonation.

I touched the short, soft, shaven fur on Peanut’s haunch and said, “How’s Rosie?”

“Okay for now,” Holly said.

Summer read the last text on Holly’s phone. “She’s been medicated and is being discharged.”

Peanut yawned and moved his leg closer so I could pet him more effectively.

“We’re not going to stop except to feed the animals, pee, get gas, and grab food,” Holly said.

“No stopping for anything that isn’t absolutely necessary from here on out,” added Summer, like she had to make it clear to the kids fooling around in the back seat to pace themselves with their water bottles. In a quieter, almost meek voice, she said, “Thanks for letting me tag along, you guys.”

Summer looked out the windshield, and Holly reached over and squeezed her leg. I waited for a flippant reply, a bit of humor to ease any discomfort there might be with such a blatant emotional display, but instead I saw Summer try to swallow.

“I don’t have a lot of friends.”

Holly offered an understanding smile to Summer, and my mood sank. I repositioned, and Moose lifted his bat-like head and with his part-buggy-Chihuahua eyes and part-pug frown appraised me. We made eye contact.

“How’d you and Rosie meet?”

I saw Holly assess me, gauge my sincerity.

“She worked for a competing law firm. I met her in a bar after work.”

Holly hesitated. I wanted her to know I was a safe haven. That I wanted to know what love at first sight looked like. “What did you guys talk about?”

“Not the law. It was like we didn’t have that in common. I asked her about the dress she was wearing.”

“What did it look like?”

“I don’t remember. It wasn’t about the dress.”

Even though she was driving, she was gazing into her past, seeing Rosie for the first time again.

“I was a goner.”

Summer rested her head against the window. “What was that like?”

“Like they say in the movies. Like being struck with a sparkler on the Fourth of July. But it didn’t burn; it felt exciting.”

“Did she feel the same?”

“Rosie said I was wearing a red dress with a wide belt, but I don’t remember. She said she asked me to borrow my lip color because she wanted something that my lips had touched.”

“I’ve never felt that,” Summer said. “I’ve felt excited, but it petered out into nothing.”

I didn’t bother to tell these two women who knew me that I hadn’t felt it either. I was so happy Holly had felt this. It’s what I wanted for Maddie in the future too. Love that felt like love.

This stream of information whetted my thirst for more, and I remembered something about Holly in that moment. College Holly had managed her anxiety by talking, and I’d helped her by listening, and I put my head back and listened as if we were back staring at the water stain in the shape of Italy on the ceiling of our old apartment.

After thirty minutes Holly said, “Close your eyes, Samantha. I’m feeling better,” and I did, and I felt better too.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

SO MUCH MORE GOING ON

I woke to the roar of a semitruck thundering by, pelting us with small rocks and spray. I inched away from the door.

“That truck felt close.”

It had rained while I dozed, and we were kicking up water, and the air felt muggy. I looked at my watch. Colorado?

“I think he’s playing a game with us. We’ve been passing each other for the last hundred miles. He gets past me, lets me catch up; he blinks his lights. He has a sticker on the back of his truck that says, ‘Truckers are the hero of the highway.’ I suppose that’s true. They bring us everything, don’t they? Produce. Fencing. You name it.”

Holly sounded cheerful—even, I dared say, peppy. I did not expect this. I expected tired, distracted by Rosie, maybe impatient.

I glanced at Summer. She wore noise-canceling headphones and an eye mask. Her head rested on a blow-up bathtub spa pillow in the shape of a seashell.

I stretched my legs under Peanut’s weight and discovered a sticky, wet drool spot on the top of my thigh. Utah had wedged herself between the headrest and Holly’s shoulders.

“How long have you been driving?”

Holly shrugged. “Summer gave me some Adderall. I don’t think it’s affecting me, but this trip hasn’t been that bad. I’m pretty sure I can drive the rest of the way tonight.”

“Summer has Adderall? All this time I haven’t had any of my sleep medication, and Summer has had a stash?”

“I don’t think this is the stuff you take. Like I said, I don’t think it’s affecting me. I’m just naturally energetic.”

I recognized the Adderall virgin. I had been one myself before I went for a sleep study and found out what I already knew, that I fell asleep too quickly during inappropriate times and slept too much for a healthy woman my age. Adderall felt like euphoria to a good girl who lived on one cup of coffee a day and for whom getting drunk was having one frozen margarita on Fridays—which was me more than Holly back in the day.

After the drug kicked in, you felt like your attention had been scrubbed clean and you could multitask—hell, multithink—and finish the things you’d had on your to-do list since the sixth grade. Your appetite went unnoticed while your mouth was like a swamp. It was a small price for the searing precision of your thoughts.

“Do you have a water bottle? I’m super thirsty,” Holly said.

I handed her a warm bottle of water. “That’s a side effect. Have you heard from Rosie or Katie?”

“No. No news is good news. See, we’re coming up on the truck.”

I checked my phone. There was a message from Drew.

BDREW: Catch me up.

I got much less of a bump of delight now that I’d seen Katie and Drew together.

In my periphery, I noticed the eighteen-wheeler slow as we approached. Holly hit her turn signal and pulled into the left lane. We crept up the long length of the vehicle, passing the rear lamps, the axle, and the exhaust system just behind the cab. As we moved parallel, the trucker turned on his overhead light and held up a sign.

“What does that say?” said Holly, squinting around Summer’s hair.

Through the rain-streaked window, across the road between us, I ducked my head and read the sign.

BLOWJOB? All block letters with an enormous question mark after the last B, which struck me as funny. The guy used punctuation to make sure whoever he showed it to knew it was a proposition, not a nickname.

“Blow job, Holly. It says blow job. Gun it and get out of here. That guy wants a blow job.” I jostled the dogs and leaned forward.

Our car swerved away from the trucker at the same time Holly hit the accelerator, and the engine surged and passed him. She overcorrected, yanking the wheel back. The tire hit the pavement edge and balanced there. I leaned into the dogs. The wheel spun off the asphalt edge, and the Prius came so close to the front wheel of the semitruck that I threw my body across Peanut and Moose, closed my eyes, and braced for impact. I felt the car veer again and heard the front wheel hit the gravel, but miraculously the tire lifted out of the shoulder, instead of being yanked into it and shoved into the ditch. The car lurched back and forth, working to find solid ground.

“Jesus.” Summer pushed the headphones off, along with her sleep mask. “What the hell, you guys?”

Everyone in the car sat at attention, panting. I whipped around, and out the back window I saw the trucker recede, his headlights blinking, the massive face of the truck appearing to laugh at us.

Holly lifted a shaky hand from the steering wheel and repositioned Utah more squarely against her neck. Her shoulders heaved as she caught her breath.

“We should change drivers,” I said.

“No! I’m not pulling over and risking that trucker grinding up next to us at this time of night.”