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fussing over the girl. It’s good for
Chrissie to move as much as she can.”
    Jack looks at me and nods. “Fine. I’ll stop
fussing.”
    I tilt my head to the side, giving him a pointed
stare. “I don’t believe you, but thank you for pretending you will.”
    He steps back toward the door, pauses and grins
at Linda. “You’re right. I’m starting to annoy her.”
    The room fills with Linda’s deep, throaty laugh.
“See. I’m always right. You need to remember that.”
    Jack looks back at me and winks. “Linda is always
right. Remember that, Chrissie.”
    I’m not even sure how to respond to that one, so
I smile and Jack finally leaves. Linda closes and bolts the front door behind
him, and collapses back against the heavy wood. She jerks her thumb toward the
driveway. “He’s probably out there listening, making sure I locked the front
door. God, that man worries about you. Sweet, but I can see that it is a little
overwhelming for you at times.”
    “It’s overwhelming all the time. I’m surprised he
didn’t spend the last ten minutes telling you how to lock up the house at
night.”
    Linda scrunches up her face. “He did tell me. And
made sure I repeated it to him.”
    Crap. How humiliating is that? “You’re kidding,
right?”
    Linda shakes her head at me. “Stop it. You
shouldn’t be annoyed with Jack. Your father is a wonderful man.”
    She says that with an intensity that surprises me
since she hardly knows him.
    “You have everything, Chrissie. A gorgeous
husband. Soon a gorgeous baby. An incredible house. An incredible father. And
everyone who knows you adores you. You are a lucky girl.”
    The over-the-top compliments take me by surprise.
Why is she being so nice to me?
    She comes to me, places an arm around my shoulder
and starts guiding me across the living room.
    “I’m so happy I get to spend some time with you.
I really want us to be closer friends. It’s important to me. Especially now.”
    The ways she says that tells me she means it. But
the especially now part is confusing. Why now?
    “Me, too.”
    I sink down on a couch. I don’t know what I’m
supposed to do to entertain Linda here. We don’t exactly live similar lives,
even if both of our husbands are musicians. We don’t really have anything in
common except Alan.
    Linda looks at me, her eyes bright. “I have news!
Do you want to hear big news or little news first?”
    I laugh. She sounds really excited. “I want to
hear both.”
    “Well,” she says in a heavy, extremely pleased
way, “Len and I are going to be permanent West Coasters soon. We’re leaving New
York. We bought a house in Pacific Palisades. I’m moving back home. Finally.”
    My brows shoot up, surprised. “Really? I never
thought you’d leave New York. It seems so you and like you’re really happy
there.”
    She rolls her eyes, shaking her head. “I’ve been
wanting to come back to California for years. I’m a So Cal girl, remember? And
it’s definitely going to simplify our life. Manny’s been living fulltime in
Malibu forever—”
    My heart stills. Alan is still living in the
Malibu house? I didn’t know that and I always thought after we ended he
would leave there. But he didn’t. And I’m suddenly filled with conflicting
reactions and some of my thoughts are vain in the extreme. Stupid, Chrissie.
Stupid. Nothing Alan does has anything to do with you anymore.
    Linda’s racing chatter pulls me from my thoughts.
“—and Manny is a fulltime occupation. So demanding. And everyone important in
our life is here. My mother lives in Encino. Doris is not young anymore. I’ve
been trying to get her to move in with us, but New York, no can do. So we moved
closer to Doris and she’s moving in and the timing is brilliant.”
    Brilliant? Brilliant for what? Trying to keep up
with Linda is always so challenging. But she looks excited, almost giddy.
    “That’s great, Linda. You seem really happy.” I
laugh. “Was that the big news or the little