Page 56 of Save the Date

Emma laughed. “I don’t mean you love your mom more than you could ever love a wife. Although those people do exist.” She shuddered as the memory of one high school boyfriend came to mind. He’d tried to get Emma to wear his mommy’s hand-me-downs because they were “nicer than anything she owned.” Last Emma checked, he still lived at home.

“What I meant is that you weren’t at all open to my idea because you don’t want to end uplikeyour mom,” Emma explained. “Trapped in a relationship with no autonomy or control.”

“Oh. Yeah. I don’t want that at all.”

Emma laughed again—this time at his visceral disgust. “What I’m wondering is why you think marrying someone after only a few months implies that you’ll end up trapped in a relationship with no autonomy or control?”

“Because…” Will thought for a moment. “Because I’m not the kind of person who would want to get married that quickly so if I did it would mean I am fundamentally changing who Iam to make someone else happy. And that feels like a slippery slope, Moskowitz.”

“I’m going to take a wild swing here and say you aren’t very good at compromise in relationships.”

Will glared at her. It was clear she wasn’t the first person in his life to suggest such a thing. She probably wasn’t even the second.

“Let’s move on to our next topic,” Will replied as he referred to his notes. “What are your thoughts on the wedding industrial complex and what role, if any, has that played in your decision-making?”

She’d gotten under his skin. And she liked it.

Twenty-Two

AS EMMA ATTEMPTED TO PARK HER SUV IN A SPOT CLEARLYlabeled Compact, she found herself returning to Will’s comment from earlier in the week.Especially when it comes to youhad pretty much been running on a loop inside her head since their conversation. The rest of their recording session had been relatively tame once Will steered them to less personal topics, but there remained a charged undercurrent under everything they said to each other. She could almost still feel the vibrations—

Stop it, Emma admonished herself. It was not appropriate to waste any more mental energy on a man who she wasn’t dating. Especially when she was dating someone else.

As she got out of the car, Emma noticed her front right tire jutting over the painted line, but she didn’t want to correct it and be late. She was meeting Matt at the two-story Crate & Barrel in Beverly Hills to help zhuzh up his condo. It felt like the most established couple activity they’d done so far, and she wanted to be fully present with him, not secretly trying to dissect the inner workings of Will’s mind.

When Emma spotted Matt perusing the kitchen appliances, she considered sneaking up on him as a goof. It was an old bitshe’d picked up from Alan, who was always popping out of nowhere to surprise Debbie. But something told her Matt wasn’t the kind of person who was looking to shriek in surprise at a furniture store. She approached him normally instead.

“See anything you like?” Emma asked by way of greeting.

“Now I do,” Matt replied before reaching down to kiss Emma hello. She stretched up on her tiptoes to help him out.

“Do you have any idea what this is?” Matt held up an oblong green-and-black culinary object that appeared to have no obvious use.

“Not a clue.”

“Me neither. That’s probably why Kelly wouldn’t let me near the kitchen. I don’t know if I told you, but she was quite the chef. She even did a summer program at the Culinary Institute.”

Emma tried not to flinch at yet another mention of his ex-wife. It was starting to feel like Kelly was haunting their every exchange. No matter what topic came up through text or conversation it somehow circled back to the woman who broke Matt’s heart. For having never met her, Emma already knew far too much about Kelly. Like how she always wore heels to work and her favorite place to run was Griffith Park andnotRunyon Canyon, like you’d expect—two personal details Emma couldn’t find less relatable.

“Do you want to check out the lamps first? I know you think your bedroom is too dark.”

A familiar voice rang out. “Oh my god, Emma? What are you doing here?”

Emma turned to find Jackie and Chris pretending to be shocked at this clearly planned encounter. Chris even had his mouth open; he was a good and loyal husband.

“Helping Matt shop for his condo,” Emma replied. “Like I told you on the phone earlier today.”

“I thought you said you were meeting himtomorrow,” Jackielied as she made her way toward her real target, Matt, who was already hugging and slapping backs with Chris.

“So great to see you, man,” Chris said, turning to introduce Jackie. “This is my wife, Jackie.”

“Hi!” Jackie nearly shrieked as she threw her arms around Matt. “It’s so nice to finally meet you.”

“Same here,” Matt replied genuinely as he looked between Jackie and Emma. “I can definitely see the resemblance.”

“Really?” Emma asked skeptically. Most people were thrown when they found out Emma and Jackie were sisters. One notable waiter had even said, “You meanstepsisters?” because her brain could not compute their shared DNA. But maybe Matt saw something most people didn’t. Or maybe he was just being polite.

“What exactly are you looking for?” Jackie asked Matt. “Not to butt in, but I took a few interior design classes before Izzy was born.”

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