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good care of her.”
    “I knew he would,” Justine said in satisfaction.
    Their friend Lucy, a local glass artist, had been staying at Artist’s Point for the past couple of months, ever since her boyfriend had broken up with her. After Lucy’s bike accident yesterday, Justine had realized that in light of Lucy’s leg injuries, and the wedding taking place that weekend, there was no way she and Zoë could take care of her. So she had talked Sam into letting Lucy recuperate at his house.
    “I told Sam how much we appreciate it,” Zoë said. “It’s incredibly nice of him, especially since he and Lucy have only gone out a couple of times before.”
    “They’re already in love with each other. They just don’t know it yet.”
    Zoë paused in the middle of trimming the fondant from another cupcake. “How do you know it, if they don’t?”
    “You should have seen Sam at the clinic yesterday. He was so worried about her, and she was so glad to see him, and for a few seconds, you could tell they were the only two people in the world.”
    As Zoë worked with the cupcakes, she pondered what she remembered of Sam Nolan from elementary school. He had been geeky and skinny. No one would have guessed that he would have grown up into the robust, good-looking man she had seen earlier that morning. Sam had a roguish quality tempered with quiet strength … he might be exactly what Lucy needed, after her boyfriend had treated her so terribly.
    “So now that Lucy’s got someone,” Justine said, “we have to find a guy for you.”
    “No we don’t,” Zoë countered evenly. “I keep telling you, I’m not ready to start that kind of relationship.”
    “You’ve been divorced for a couple of years now, and you’ve been a nun. Sex is good for you, you know. Relieves stress and improves cardiovascular health, and lowers the risk of prostate cancer, and besides—”
    “I don’t have a prostate. Men have prostates.”
    “I know, but think of how much you’ll be helping some poor guy out.”
    A reluctant grin spread across Zoë’s face.
    There could have been no better antidote for Zoë’s shyness and occasional self-doubt than Justine. She was like a cool, brisk September breeze that blew away the sultry heat of summer and made you think of apples and wool sweaters and planting tulip bulbs.
    Before rolling out the next sheet of fondant, Zoë poured some coffee, and told Justine about a phone call she’d received that morning. The previous day, her grandmother Emma, who was living in a senior apartment at an independent living community in Everett, had been taken to a nearby medical facility. She had complained of numbness in her left arm and leg, and had seemed disoriented. It had turned out to be a ministroke, but the doctor believed that with physical therapy, she would regain most of the use of the affected limbs.
    “But when they did a brain scan,” Zoë said, “they found that she’d already had a few ministrokes. It’s a condition called—oh, right now I can’t remember the word—but it basically boils down to a diagnosis of vascular dementia.”
    “Oh, Zoë.” Justine reached out to put her hand on Zoë’s back, and kept it there for a moment. “I’m sorry. Is that a kind of Alzheimer’s?”
    “No, but it’s similar. With vascular dementia, it’s a stair-step process … one of these ministrokes takes away some of your ability, and then you plateau for a while, and then you have another episode—” Zoë broke off and blinked against tears. “Eventually she’ll have a major stroke, and that’s that.”
    Justine frowned. “When Emma came out to visit over Christmas, she was in great shape. Didn’t seem at all her age. What is she now, like, ninety?”
    “Eighty-seven.”
    “Do you need to go to her?” Justine asked quietly.
    “Yes, I thought tomorrow after the wedding reception—”
    “No, I mean right now.”
    “I have a hundred and seventy-two cupcakes to cover with