THE NEXT MORNING, she convinced Gideon that she wanted time to practice by herself. After making sure she was able to get off the lift on her own, he disappeared to find Tom and Marybeth on the black diamonds. Ivy bore through the pain but on her second run, her legs simply gave out and she tumbled violently down a hill and skidded into the marked-off terrain on the side of the slope. She unstrapped her skis and walked all the way back down. She went to the lodge. The breakfast crowd was still thick at nine in the morning. She purchased coffee, a plate of eggs, ham, beans on toast, and an enormous slice of apple pie, eating everything in great greedy mouthfuls, barely chewing, burning her mouth with a large gulp of coffee. Around her, people clomped around in heavy boots, the snowboarders dressed extravagantly in colorful gear, the skiers sleek and elegant in their fur-lined jackets.

After she finished eating, she relocated to a recently vacated chair by the window. She sat, facing the slopes, and she waited. She’d brought no book or magazine, and her phone had no service. There was nothing to distract her as she waited for the people she’d come with. If they decided to abandon her here, there was nothing she could do. Ridiculous really, how one could attach oneself to strangers and pretend it was normal. Are you fucking joking? Joking, always joking… Am I a joke to them, she wondered. Were the three of them together now, laughing about her? She looked at the landscape outside. The spots of brown peeking underneath the branches of the trees in the distance sent a shot of loneliness through her.

When Gideon came in for lunch, she waved him over and pretended she’d just come in not too long ago.

“How was it?” Gideon asked, apple-cheeked, exuding vitality.

“Fine,” she said with a tight smile. “Fell a few times. I was getting sore so I called it a day. Where are Tom and Marybeth?”

Gideon shrugged. “Not sure… I’ve been on my own all morning. They’re probably on the moguls, but these old things can’t keep up.” He patted his knees.

He’d been on his own all morning…! There was nothing like dissipating paranoia to make a person feel so giddy and gay… Ivy wanted to laugh and cheer and say frivolous things. Sensing the change in her, Gideon grinned and said, “I think I’ll hang out with you here after lunch.”

“Let’s get dessert,” Ivy said joyfully.

They found two armchairs in the smaller dining room, next to the bar. A band was setting up in the corner. Gideon ordered two hot toddies. “You’ve never had one of these?” he said in amazement when Ivy asked what it was. “Never,” she said. She drank three. It was so delicious she wanted to cry.

That evening, the four of them relaxed in the hot tub on the balcony of their villa. The temperature was a cool fifteen degrees, the black night lit with a million stars. In the distance came the twinkling lights from the little ski village below where they’d had dinner: cheese fondue and poutine. This time, Ivy kept the fact that she’d never tried either to herself.

Tom and Marybeth, having exerted all their aggression skiing, were in an agreeable mood and kissing in the water. The green strap of Marybeth’s string bikini was partially untied, trailing behind her back like a blade of grass. On the opposite end of the half circle sat Gideon, the steam rising over his handsome face, his eyes gazing into the distant mountains. Ivy floated over to him.

“Where are you thinking?”

He smiled at her. “There are two places I love most—here and our cottage in Cattahasset. Give me mountains and water and I’m a happy man.”

She thanked him for keeping her company today.

“I had a good time.” His toe touched hers under the water. Their eyes unwillingly fell on Marybeth and Tom.

“Ivy?”

“Hmm?”

“I’m going to kiss you now.” And he did.

How did it feel? It felt as light and buoyant as the stars above, watching over them in their cold, distant glory.

9

THEIR FOURSOME WAS A REGULAR fixture at Boston’s best brunch and seafood spots that winter. Platters of oysters doused with sriracha and lemon, creamy clam chowders bubbling in sourdough bread bowls, sweet and tender lobster meat dripping with butter. And how lovely the city looked in winter! The dreamy glitter of fresh snow, the cold noonday sun, the nippy air carrying with it smells of earth, sap, the impending whiff of spring. Never before had Ivy found her students, especially Arabella, so pleasant and endearing, eternal sources of stories for Gideon. They all had their roles in the new group—Gideon, the voice of reason; Marybeth, the instigator; Tom, the talker, the one whose moods they all navigated around; and Ivy, the outsider, someone they showed off for yet took for granted. The temporary distraction.

Only she wasn’t. She stuck around.

She waited a month before sleeping with Gideon. It happened on Valentine’s Day. After drinks at the Hotel Commonwealth, he took her back to his studio apartment. Exposed brick walls, bay windows, marine-blue bathroom tiles so cool and polished they appeared fluorescent, like being inside an aquarium. “S-sorry for the m-me-me-mess.” He glanced around vaguely, lifted a pile of books off the sofa, put them back down again without purpose. Ivy’s heart softened. This was the real Gideon, she thought. The one who stuttered when he was nervous. The one who couldn’t meet her eye. She was always looking for the real Gideon. She never stopped to wonder what would happen should she find him one day. “It’s wonderful,” she said before pulling him down on top of her.

Afterward, he wrapped her in her coat, kissed her on the cheek, and put her in a cab home—as neat as wrapping a present. It was raining outside. A foggy, gray sky cast everything in its cold shadow. What do you see when you look upon the world, Gideon? She tried to infuse the city’s dark alleys with his dignified imperturbability, but she could not. Without his presence, the loiterers on her corner frightened her, the gossamer objects floating in the gust of wind were just plastic bags. That was the thing about getting too much happiness at once. Without time to adjust, the pain of not having it suddenly became unbearable.

A week later, Gideon came over to her old Victorian house for the first time. To prepare for his visit, Ivy scrubbed the toilet, cleaned the fridge of the moldy onions and garlic, vats of gunky yogurt, Andrea’s half-eaten yams and empty egg cartons. She washed her bedding, vacuumed the carpet, bought so many long-stemmed irises, their purple and yellow petals iridescent by candlelight, that her walls glowed like a lava lamp. There was nothing she could do about her seedy neighborhood but she even tried to tackle the yard, raking the dead leaves, mostly reduced to brown slime, from the patch of sidewalk in front of the house, and dragging the ugly row of trash bins into the backyard.

Gideon was distracted when he came over. One of the Big Three had injured his knee, he told her, and suddenly the Celtics’ championship no longer seemed so certain. Ivy, too, felt despondent. She had cooked spaghetti Bolognese, toasted garlic bread, tossed a salad with stuffed olives, and opened a bottle of Sancerre, but Gideon was barely eating. He must really be cut up about the basketball thing. She felt a wave of tenderness toward him then, for his passions and his troubles, which, to her, were the wholesome troubles of a child.

After dinner, they went to Dresdan’s for drinks so Gideon could meet Andrea. Ivy had prepared him by explaining Andrea as “my friend who plays violin for the Boston Symphony Orchestra. She’s quite a handful, but she’s kind,” Ivy added, not wanting Gideon to think she was bad-mouthing a friend. “She’d be the first one to have your back in a fight.”

“That’s all that matters,” Gideon agreed.

When they got to the bar, a jazz quartet was just setting up. Already, it was packed with a noisy, buoyant crowd, driven mostly by a group of office workers jostling to buy another round for the birthday boy, whose right forearm was covered in tallies, drawn on with permanent marker, of how many shots he’d had so far. Just as Gideon ordered their drinks, Andrea arrived dressed in skintight faux leather leggings and a shrunken leopard-patterned sweater, her lipstick the deep plum color of sangria. Lips and hips, Andrea’s trademark weapons. “Traffic was awful!” she said, somehow managing to hug both Ivy and Gideon simultaneously. Her yam and boiled egg diet had worked. She’d lost fifteen pounds and her face had taken on that taut, dark-eyed look of the hungry. She was very luminous tonight. The undercurrent of cheap sex she usually emitted had taken on depth and mystery. That was the power of beauty.