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Cause for concern, you bet, but for this? Insufficient grounds.
    She had no towels in her case and was reduced to drying herself with a t-shirt. At least she had clean underwear, and socks, and a top and jeans that had only been worn once. She pulled her boots on, zipped up her scuffed old suede jacket (the reassuring feeling, like the protective arm of an old friend) and gave the house one last go-round. That’s when she climbed the spiral staircase from the office to discover her nook still intact. And that’s when Dee arrived.
    They say a best friend is one who’ll drop everything, no matter when, and come to your aid. The only person Claire knows she could ask to do that is Dee St Clair. And here they are, Claire wiping her tears away, Dee doing that thing with her face (she’s known for her faces) where she warns you she’s going to say something serious by setting her mouth and going all scowly with her eyes, which always makes Claire laugh, even now.
    â€˜Crying, laughing, mother of God, if it was the fifties, I’d get to slap you for being hysterical.’
    â€˜If it was the fifties, I’d probably take it.’
    â€˜You’d probably like it. Here, drink some more whiskey.’
    â€˜I don’t even like whiskey.’
    Claire drinks some anyway – Woodford Reserve, bourbon Danny got as a gift that mysteriously found its way up here. For which relief much thanks: there’s nothing else in the house, and she needs a drink.
    â€˜Atta girl,’ Dee says. ‘Now. Let me try and recap on our situation here. Your husband has cleared the house of possessions, furniture and fittings and split the scene
with
kids in tow but
without
letting his wife know where he’s going, or why he’s going, or even
that
he’s going. Now, it’s unlikely that Danny’s done this of his own free and rational will. Either he’s been coerced, or he’s lost his reason: either way, the girls are in danger. How am I doing so far?’
    â€˜He could well have a good reason.’
    â€˜And what might that be?’
    â€˜I don’t know, obviously.’
    â€˜Another woman? Money troubles?’
    â€˜Hey! Back off, Nancy Drew, and let me think.’
    â€˜I’m sorry. Between the helpful friend and the bossy bitch, it’s a fine line.’
    Claire takes a sip of whiskey, grimaces and looks at Dee, who is midway through her third without any apparent ill effect. Dee with her sallow skin and black eyes and corkscrew curls, raven feathers skeined with silver now, Dee with her velvet and leather and lace, her bangles and beads and hoop earrings, Dee working her Californian gypsy rock chick thing. Dee landed in Madison because the guy she met and married in LA when she was nineteen ran an antiques business here. Before he was killed in a traffic accident a couple of years later, he set her up in her own hair and beauty salon on Dayton.
    They met when Dee cut Claire’s hair the Christmas of her second year at university. They’ve been friends ever since. Maybe it’s on account of Claire having no family outside Dan and the kids (even her adoptive parents are dead, and she has no step-siblings) that Dee gets bumped up the ranks and accorded family status. And Dee has no family either, just a flaky mom who shows up beween husbands for sympathy and understanding which she doesn’t deserve, but invariably gets. They are effectively sisters and, as with sisters, love can quickly turn to hate, usually within the time it takes to empty a glass.
    The brashness, the outspoken, loudest-girl-in-the-class quality that Claire loves about Dee (because Claire may have worked in the theater, but in manner she is anything but theatrical) can in an instant appear crass or gauche. The constant stream of sexual innuendo and inquisitiveness runs sour and desperate. And even though Dee does seem to have sex on her mind at all times, there’s something, not