What was wrong with her lately? Pregnancy seemed to be stripping away all her emotional maturity. She had all these new raw, out-of-control feelings. Moments of pure fury followed by hopeless despair. Good Lord. She was behaving like a client.

“Sorry.” Ellen smiled at Madeline to make up for her silent shrieking. “I drifted off.”

“Well, I think there must have been more to it than just hormones,” said Julia. “Did it make you feel guilty? Knowing that you were having a baby with her husband? Of course, you’re the expert on repressed feelings.”

Ellen gave Julia a grateful look. Unlike Madeline, Julia had always been supportive and proud of Ellen’s work. Over the years she’d referred dozens of friends and acquaintances to her. Yes, she was a dear, dear friend.

“Are you crying now?” asked Julia. “Just remembering it?”

“No, sorry, I just—” Ellen began to giggle hopelessly.

She saw Julia and Madeline exchange looks.

“I know pregnant women go a bit crazy,” said Julia. “But isn’t this excessive?”

“Yes,” said Madeline.

“I hate to think what you did when you met your father for the first time,” said Julia. “You must have needed a sedative.” She put the back of her hand to her forehead. “Daddy, Daddy! My long-lost daddy!”

Madeline chortled and then looked guilty. “Although, I guess, maybe meeting your father probably was quite emotional, was it?”

“Actually,” said Ellen, “I had the opposite problem. I felt nothing. Absolutely nothing.”

“Really?” Madeline looked relieved. That was more like it.

“He was just a man,” said Ellen. “A dull, ordinary man. Like your dentist. Or your accountant. Receding hairline. Glasses. I just didn’t find him that interesting.”

“Poor Daddy,” said Julia into her wineglass.

“You know what I really want to talk about?” Ellen put down her knife and fork. “Boxes. Boxes clogging up my hallway.”

“That doesn’t sound especially interesting,” said Julia.

“They’re Patrick’s, right?” Madeline immediately grasped the situation.

“Yes,” said Ellen. “I asked and asked and he won’t move them. It’s driving me crazy. How do you make a man do something without nagging?”

“That,” said Madeline, “is the billion-dollar question.”

I was watching the late news tonight when it suddenly came to me.

I knew exactly who that man was.

So what did he want with Ellen? And why was he so angry with her?

Ellen sat in the car in the dark without turning the keys in the ignition and luxuriated in the sudden silence after the noisy babble in the restaurant. Her ears were buzzing, and she felt overstimulated, as if she’d just been having a crazy drunken night out in a nightclub, not a sedate, alcohol-free dinner with two old friends. For some reason she had found Julia and Madeline a little overwhelming tonight. Their faces in that crowded booth had been so close to hers: Julia’s fine-boned face with the surprising lines around the eyes (surprising because Ellen would always think of her as a fourteen-year-old schoolgirl) and Madeline’s plumper, softer features with the upturned nose and the rosebud lips. Ellen could still smell Julia’s perfume and hear the rhythms of Madeline’s slightly hoarse voice (she had the beginnings of a cold).

“I’m seeing Sam tomorrow night,” Julia had said to her, as they stood on the pavement outside the restaurant, after Madeline had hurried off.

“Stinky? He really did have the flu that time? I knew it! You’ve been seeing him? Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”

“We don’t call him that,” said Julia. “Anyway, don’t get all excited and start planning cozy little double dates. We’re just friends.”

Ellen could see hope shining bright in Julia’s eyes.

“Stop it,” said Julia, when she saw the expression on Ellen’s face. “Not a word.” But her arms tightened around Ellen when she hugged her good-bye.

Now Ellen glanced at her watch. As they’d skipped the movie, it was only nine-thirty. There was a good chance Jack would still be up when she got home. He seemed to stay up very late for an eight-year-old, but what did she know?

She knew that Patrick would be entirely respectful if she was to suggest that Jack’s bedtime be changed, but she felt so self-conscious when it came to parenting this self-sufficient little boy, as if she was just playacting. She should have asked Madeline what time her children went to bed. She would have set her straight.

It was so nice to not be going home to an empty house. The lights would be blazing as she pulled up in the driveway. When she opened the door, there would be the smell of tacos or popcorn or some other late-night snack. Patrick and Jack would be watching television together, or playing some game on the Wii, or chasing each other through the house, brandishing the branch that had once hung on her ceiling to remind her to practice mindfulness and had now somehow become a sword or a laser gun or something (they seemed so violent sometimes!). Patrick would ask about the movie. Jack would want to tell her something about his day. They would have hot chocolate and some of the fund-raiser chocolates Jack was meant to be selling for school. Patrick would tell Jack to go to bed about twenty times and he finally would.

Yes, it was so very nice to be going home to the hubbub of the family life she’d always wanted.