Coco was funnier than she remembered, which was maybe due to the fact that she’d gotten a little fat during her pregnancy. She had always been a tiny girl, but now on her short frame was the unmistakable blubber of leftover baby.

“Al I want now is sausage,” she told Isabel a with wide eyes. “It’s unreal. Red meat and sausage.”

She offered Isabel a a glass of wine and poured some red into two oversized glasses. “I’m not real y supposed to drink if I’m breast-feeding, but fuck it. I just went nine months without a drink. Plus, I go crazy by the end of the day with just this little blob to keep me company,” she said, smiling at the baby.

Isabel a liked Fat Coco more than she’d ever liked the other one.

They drank until dinner and nibbled on cheese and crackers. They passed around the baby and Coco opened the present. Isabel a held Elizabeth and wished that she’d brought her the bunny. By the time they sat down, they were al a little drunk.

Brinkley put the steaks on everyone’s plates and gave Coco the largest one, which struck Isabel a as incredibly kind. She’d always thought Brinkley would be the kind of husband who wouldn’t want a chubby wife. But he didn’t care! Coco had just had their baby and he was grateful.

Isabel a felt tears come to her eyes and made a mental note to stop drinking the wine.

Harrison and Isabel a made a plan to go to Newbury Street to walk around and have lunch, but by the time Isabel a was showered and dressed and got down to the kitchen the next morning, there was another plan al set. Coco was packing a picnic basket for them to bring to Boston Common.

Who owned a picnic basket? Did everyone have one except for Isabel a?

Isabel a kept looking at Harrison to catch his eye. This was not the plan. But he didn’t seem to notice. He poured himself a cup of coffee and talked to Brinkley about some guy they knew who’d been fired for stealing from clients. Isabel a wasn’t sure, but she thought the guy’s name was Mortimer.

Harrison leaned over his coffee, stuffing his nose right over the top as he inhaled. “Now, this,” he said, looking at Isabel a, “this is real coffee.”

Isabel a hated him so much she almost spit. His nostrils looked huge when he smel ed the coffee, and she felt nauseous. She smiled and asked for Advil.

Isabel a hadn’t been on a picnic for as long as she could remember. Maybe even longer. And she knew why. It was uncomfortable to sit outside and awkward to pass around thermoses fil ed with soup, trying not to spil them on clothes, holding on to napkins as they blew away. She was smiling, though, so as not to be rude. Her head hurt from the wine and she wished that she were stil in bed. It was cold when the wind blew—too cold, certainly, to be sitting outside for a meal.

Boston Common was pretty, especial y with al of the leaves changing colors and the beautiful brownstones in the background. Everyone in Boston looked cleaner and more awake than people in New York. But Boston Common was not Central Park, and it looked smal and eager to Isabel a, like it was trying too hard.

The baby was bundled up to the point of insanity. Al Isabel a could see was a teeny nose sticking out of a pile of blankets. Coco leaned over and touched her nose to the baby. Isabel a felt something that was certainly jealousy, although she wasn’t sure why. She wished that she wanted to sit closer to Harrison and have his arm wrapped around her, but she didn’t.

Harrison was explaining how the hedge fund he worked for was adjusting to the economy and how their outlook was changing. Every time he said the word “derivatives,” Isabel a’s temples throbbed. Coco and Brinkley listened intently, and not just to be polite. They were interested in what he was saying.

He was boring, Isabel a realized. She watched him tel a story about work and it hit her: He was boring, and his friends were boring, and this picnic right now was boring. Harrison probably had a secret desire to get married and move to Boston and get a golden retriever and be boring al the time. She didn’t know him at al .

And worse, what if he didn’t want to marry her and move to Boston? She wasn’t quite sure she wanted to be with him, but she was quite sure that she wanted him to want that. Her brain swirled inside her head, and she closed her eyes and tilted her head back to face the sun.

Sometimes Harrison seemed like an old man, crooked and worn out. He was cranky at the end of workdays, loosening his tie and watching the evening news. They probably shouldn’t have moved in together so soon, but rent in New York was insane and both of their leases were up and they were spending almost every night together anyway. It seemed like a good idea. Now Isabel a couldn’t imagine how they would ever get out of it even if they wanted to.

“Do you ever hate Ken?” Isabel a had asked her friend Mary a couple of weeks ago. They were getting manicures on a Wednesday night after work and the question just came out. Ken was Mary’s new boyfriend, a nice guy who made al of their friends comment, “Oh, there he is. That’s what she’s been waiting for,” as if finding your perfect match was a guarantee as long as you were patient enough.

Mary raised her eyebrows and looked closely at a nail she’d just smudged.

“Hate him?” she asked.

“Yeah. Hate him,” Isabel a said. “The other night I looked at Harrison and I just … I don’t know.”

“I don’t know if I ever hate him,” Mary said. “But he sure bugs the living fuck out of me sometimes.”

That night they al went to the North End for Italian food. They ate pasta and drank less wine than they had the night before, and Brinkley, Coco, and Harrison al exchanged information about people they’d gone to school with.

“Cathleen’s pregnant again,” Coco said. “But she’s not real y tel ing anyone yet, so don’t say anything.”

Coco always knew the best gossip, and almost everything she said was fol owed by a disclaimer that she wasn’t supposed to repeat it. The first time Isabel a had met Coco was at a wedding of Brinkley and Harrison’s friend Tom. Coco spent most of the reception sharing bits of information with Isabel a. The bride had cheated on the groom in col ege with another friend, Dave, who hadn’t been invited to the wedding, and also one of the bridesmaids had been in love with the groom since freshman year!

Isabel a took these confidences to mean that Coco real y liked her, that she wanted to be friends, and she was flattered by the attention. But after a few more encounters, Isabel a realized there was nothing special about her. Coco just couldn’t keep a secret.

Back at their house, Coco put out cookies and poured everyone some wine. The baby was wide awake, and lay on the floor on a pink blanket with a mobile of stuffed farm animals above her. She babbled at them like she was tel ing a story.

“You have a lot to say tonight, don’t you?” Coco asked the baby.

“Just like her mother,” Harrison said, and they al laughed.

For some reason this made Isabel a feel left out, like she was crashing a reunion. She sat on the floor next to the baby, pretending to be so interested in Elizabeth that she didn’t care about the conversation around her. The three of them were stil trading information about people from col ege, but they had moved on to peripheral friends, people Isabel a had never even met.

“Dorothea got laid off!” Coco almost yel ed this one, so happy that she’d remembered it. She tucked her legs underneath her, gearing up to tel the whole story. “She was just about to be promoted too, or that’s what she thought. And she was looking at places to buy in the city when they cal ed her in. Can you believe it?” She took a sip of wine for dramatic effect. “She’s pretty embarrassed about it, so don’t broadcast it or anything.

She had to move back in with her parents on Long Island. Can you imagine? Ugh,” Coco shuddered.

Isabel a actual y could imagine it and she wondered if she was the only one. Her life, as it was, felt very thin, very transportable. If she were to lose her job, moving back in with her parents might be exactly what she’d do. She wasn’t married to Harrison, and they didn’t have a child. She could just sel her bed and couch and pack up and move home to her parents’ house, easy as pie.