After a long and delightfully uneventful flight from Chicago, Jessie walked down the long corridor at Newark Airport and grinned as she saw Steph waving. Just outside the security gate, Jessie dropped her carry-on bag and the two women hugged. Jostled from all sides, they moved out of the line of deplaning passengers. “You took tremendous,” Steph said.

      “You like?” Jessie said, turning so Steph could appreciate her new navy linen pantsuit and pale pink tailored blouse. “I went shopping yesterday. I’m new from the skin out.” She lifted one foot and waggled it to show off her new navy low-heeled opera pumps. “And from the top down.”

      “You look fabulous,” Steph said, “but I’m disappointed. I wanted to take you shopping myself. You need jeans, shorts, T-shirts, things like that. And, although I lead a denim kind of life most of the time, you’ll need a dress or two.”

      “We will shop until we drop, to coin a phrase,” Jessie said, settling the strap of her suitcase on her shoulder. “I only bought a few things and I brought my checkbook and my credit cards.”

      “You’re doing okay, financially, I gather.”

      “I’m doing just fine. The business is thriving despite the economy and Rob, under mild duress, was very generous, bless his pointed little head.”

      “Are you getting alimony?”

      “We hassled for a while. His practice nets him in the low six figures but I just wanted payment for the years I spent putting him through dental school so he could drill his bimbo.”

      “Bitter, darling?” Steph asked, raising one eyebrow.

      Jessie sighed. “I have my moments. But on to better topics. What do we have planned for the next week or so?”

      “I thought you might want to relax for a few days. Become a vegetable. So I arranged my schedule so that I’m at the gift shop at the hospital Monday and Thursday, but for the rest of the week, I’m yours.” Steph had been working at the shop at the hospital for several years and, since her arrival, it had become a profitable business for the small local institution.

      “You like working at the hospital. I wish I had something like that, something that made me feel good about myself.”

      “So do it. When you get back…. No, I won’t talk about you going back to Illinois. It’ll spoil my good mood.”

      “And how’s Brian?”

      “He’s great, working hard and playing hard. He’s got a tennis game this afternoon, but he said to give you a kiss and tell you he’d see you at dinner.”

      “God, I’m so glad to see you,” Jessie said, hugging her friend again.

      The two women walked toward the baggage claim area stopping occasionally to hug again. “How much luggage did you bring?” Steph asked, matching her stride to her friend’s.

      “Only one large suitcase with some essentials and enough clothes to hold me for a few days. I didn’t want any leftovers.” She heaved a great sigh. “The house is ready to go. And I do mean go. It’s well priced and should sell quickly. And the office is better organized than I’d like to admit.”

      In the baggage claim area, they spotted the illuminated sign for the flight from Chicago and reached the edge of the carousel just as it started to move. “We’re looking for a beige tapestry suitcase with brown trim,” Jessie said.

      As they watched, the first bag over the top of the chute and onto the turning plates was Jessie’s. “That’s never happened to me before,” Jessie said, her mouth hanging open. “My suitcase is usually so far down the line that almost everyone has already left.”

      “Well,” Steph said, “it’s an omen.” She hefted the bag from the moving platform. “Good luck and good things are coming.”

      “Oh, I hope so.” Jessie fumbled in her purse for her baggage stub. “Sometimes I’m so up, excited about starting a new phase in my life.” She looked her best friend in the eyes. “Then, at other times, I’m so down. Rob and I were comfortable and good together. I knew what he was thinking and he knew….” Her eyes began to fill. “It’s so final.”

      “None of that,” Steph said, linking her free arm with her friend’s. “Only good thoughts will be permitted.”

      Jessie shook her head and a wisp of hair fell from her French knot. Impatiently she stuffed it into one of the bobby pins that pulled her hair tight against her head. “Right. Only good thoughts.”

      They arrived in Harrison and had just pulled Jessie’s suitcase from the trunk of Steph’s BMW when Brian drove up the long driveway, honking the horn of his Lexus and grinning through the windshield. He pulled to a stop, jumped out of the car, and enveloped Jessie in a giant bearhug. “Oh, JJ,” he said, reverting to Jessie’s nickname from their days in high school. “I’m so glad to see you.”

      “Me too,” she said, hugging him back. “I’d almost forgotten the days of being called JJ. You’re the only one who calls me that anymore. It takes me back.”

      “If you hadn’t been so hooked on Rob, I would have jumped you back then and Steph would have had to find someone else.”

      “You are so full of it, Brian,” Jessie said, laughing, swatting him on the ass. “You should have been born Irish.”

      “Okay, okay, so I exaggerate a bit. But I am glad to see you.”

      Jessie pushed Brian to arm’s length and looked him over. Although he was not particularly tall, Brian was a big man, with large hands and feet and an open, ingenuous smile that lit up his ordinary-looking face. His tennis whites accentuated his oversized arms and legs, all covered with heavy black hair. His skin was heavily tanned, making his eyes look even paler than she remembered. She hugged him again, enjoying the feel of a virile man after so many months alone. “You look fantastic, sir,” she said, a bit embarrassed by the erotic thoughts his tight shorts aroused. “And happy.”

      Brian reached out and draped his arm around his wife’s shoulders. “Happy doesn’t describe it.” He pecked Steph on the cheek, then said, “When’s dinner? I’m starved.”

      “Everything’s in the fridge and ready to go. You get the fire started and I’ll show Jessie to her room.”

      “Will