A colder breeze swirled through the porch, and I rubbed my arms over my thin cotton shirt. “Oh, Lib. I’ll never be able to thank you enough for the way you’ve changed my life. And Gus’s life.”

“Don’t thank me, Heather. I’ve seen your potential, and it’s our job as human beings to bring it out in each other. Do you know how much I admire your ambition? Too many women these days are cavalier about their careers—they just count on the fact that they’ll meet a husband who will make all the money.”

“Mm.” I wondered briefly if she could read my mind, if she knew I had the exact same ambition.

“Though my grandmother did always say, ‘It’s just as easy to marry a rich man as a poor man.’” Libby chuckled. “And then I went and fell in love with a starving artist.”

“Well, it was different for you. You knew you’d never have to worry about money.”

“I suppose you’re right. Peter could’ve done anything with that math mind of his. He’s really brilliant. He could’ve made a killing in finance—that’s where all the money is. But, in his soul, all he ever wanted was to make his art. He never cared about the money piece. I think that’s why I fell for him. Most men I knew—the men in my family included—were so driven by money, by the status the ‘right’ job provided. I’d never seen passion like Peter’s.

“Not that it’s a bad thing to be money driven,” Libby added quickly. “It can be quite the opposite. But Peter was just so different than anyone I’d ever known. He told me I was his muse. His whole way of being enticed me.”

“Honest question for you, Lib.” The wine struck a warm confidence through my bones. I felt sure that I could say almost anything without offending her. She was rich and beautiful and educated and articulate, but she was also silly and humble and as open as the ocean. “Playing devil’s advocate here, but do think your financial … situation … allowed Peter the freedom to continue to be the passionate man you loved?”

Libby pressed her lips together in thought, gazing out over the dark meadow that stretched beyond the backyard. She plucked the bottle of wine from the side table and poured what was left into our glasses.

“To be honest, I don’t know,” she replied finally. “My family money has certainly allowed him to keep being an artist. If we’d needed money and Peter had been forced to take a higher-paying job, I don’t believe our love would have changed. I believe he would have done so willfully, and I believe he would’ve remained passionate at heart. But the truth is, Heather, you never really know. You hope for the best, but when you commit to a marriage, it’s always a risk. You can never truly predict what’s going to happen when you take two people and tie them together and blindly throw them out into the great big world.” Libby looked at me, the whites of her eyes shiny in the near darkness. “For example, passion means one thing when you’re twenty-two and in the honeymoon phase, and another when you’re thirty and married with babies.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, deeply curious.

“I still love Peter’s passion.” She sighed. “But I didn’t know it would be like this.”

“Like what?”

Libby stretched her skinny arms toward the sky. “Oh, that being Peter’s wife would mean learning to be okay with the fact that my husband spends fifteen hours a day, six, sometimes seven days a week closed off in his studio, making sure every tiny detail of every single one of his pieces is entirely perfect. That the passion I fell in love with has become a quality I sometimes have to work not to resent.”

“I guess I always assumed he was extra busy because of the project here in Langs Valley.”

“He is, but there’s always some project, and it’s always this important. Peter had been feeling uninspired in Connecticut and felt like my parents were around too much since we’d had kids, so I promised him a year up north after our second was born. He grew up visiting an aunt who lived in Saranac and had always wanted to come back to the Adirondacks and do a mountain study. But his schedule is just insane. The ironic thing is, I constantly find myself thinking about the fact that it doesn’t have to be this way, that he could work twenty-five hours a week and spend so much more time with the kids and me.”

“Can’t you say anything to him about it?”

“I have.” Libby shrugged. “But whenever I do, I can see it just makes him so … sad. Because this is who he is, through and through. He’s an artist, not a part-time artist. And I knew that when I married him. I don’t know, I get so confused. He is a good father—he spends time with the kids every day. It’s mostly me I wish he’d make more time for. Especially because subconsciously I know that if he worked less, it wouldn’t make a speck of difference.” Libby rubbed her thumb against her first and middle fingers. “Don’t get me wrong—he does fine for himself, much better than a lot of artists in his field. But with the amount in my trust, it’s just completely insignificant.” Libby glanced down into her empty glass. “Gosh, I’ve had too much wine and now I’m sounding like a total brat. I’m so sorry, Heather, you must think I’m a—”

“Lib, stop,” I interjected, fueled by the alcohol again. “You’re allowed to vent to me—we’re friends. I’m not lying when I say you’ve become one of the best friends I have.” I omitted the full truth, which was that Libby had become my only friend. Kyla and the other girls didn’t talk to me anymore, and I couldn’t blame them. I was the one who’d cut them out in the first place, right after I’d ditched Burke. The only way I knew how to move forward with my plan was alone.

“Heather.” Libby reached for my hand and squeezed my palm. “You have no idea how lonely I’d be here without you. You are my dear friend, and that’s not just the wine talking. I feel very lucky that we met.”

“I feel lucky too, Lib.” A soft feeling—happiness, perhaps—washed through me.

In retrospect sometimes it’s barely believable, the extent to which things changed. The twisted irony of it all. Not two months later I’d learn that meeting Libby Fontaine was the unluckiest occurrence of my life. But by then, it would be too late.

Chapter Sixteen

Skye

JUNE 2019

Lexy convinces me to have a “low-key” bachelorette party in the Hamptons. I made my friends promise that if I agreed to do a bachelorette, there’d be no fuss around my thirtieth birthday in July. Lexy has arranged for us to stay in her dad’s house in Amagansett; Lexy’s parents are divorced and her father spends almost all of his time with his second wife at their place in Charleston.

The last weekend in June, eight of us board the Jitney from midtown on Friday afternoon and head east. In addition to my bridesmaids I’ve also invited Kate, Sophia, and Taylor, my three other closest friends from Barnard, all hallmates from freshman year. Brooke was supposed to fly east for the weekend, but she called to tell me she’s eight weeks pregnant and having awful morning sickness. I’m not allowed to share the news yet, but my toes have been tingling ever since I found out she and my brother are having a baby. I’m going to be an aunt.

Lexy’s father’s house is a shingle-style mansion just past the town of Amagansett, half a mile from the beach. It’s offensively large and well maintained for being used so rarely, even in the prime summer months. Mr. Blane doesn’t rent it out, partly so that Lexy and her younger sister, Bridget, can use the house as they please, but mostly because he doesn’t need to.

Being defined by her family’s money doesn’t bother Lexy the way it bothers me. For better or worse, Lex doesn’t have a problem with not actually having a career. Her “job” is essentially the Instagram presence she’s created with her hunky kiteboarder husband as they travel the world on her father’s dime in pursuit of new content to grow their following.

We could be the next Helen Owen and Zack Kalter, I’ve heard Lexy muse on more than one occasional. The claim is outrageous on so many levels that it’s not even worth the attempt to pull Lexy back down to earth. She’s a dreamer and a dilettante through and through, but she’s also the most fiercely loyal person I know. In addition to punching Sasha Bateman in middle school, when Lexy overheard Hilary Mandeville telling people I belonged in a mental hospital, Lexy whacked her in the shins during field-hockey practice and got suspended from the team for the rest of the season. When the shit with Max LaPointe went down, Lexy publicly shamed him to her tens of thousands of Instagram followers. I didn’t ask her to, but this is the quintessential Lexy Blane Hill reaction when anyone wrongs one of her friends.