“We knocked it all out. I say a little reward is in order.” Lauren pulled a bottle of prosecco from the refrigerator and expertly popped the cork, tipping a few ounces into two wineglasses she had laid out on the kitchen island.
Since the drive from JFK, they had managed to unpack, make supermarket and liquor store runs, and put away the cheese, crackers, chips, dips, eggs, bread, milk, coffee, and every other thing they piled into their overflowing grocery cart.
The house had three bedrooms. One was the upstairs suite with a king bed, en suite bathroom, and a deck with a view of the bay. The parents’ room, which meant it was Lauren’s room, no question. She was the original Queen Bee. The elder. Their glue. The one who had remained close to both May and Kelsey after the May/Kelsey BFF Duo had fallen out of touch. Even though the three of them were a hive now, Lauren somehow felt like the overlap in their Venn diagrams.
A smaller bedroom was next door, simply furnished with a full bed and a single nightstand. The first floor had a second suite with its own bathroom and a sliding glass door out to the pool deck.
May took the small room. No deck, no view, no en suite bath. She was the one who had to go back to the city early, and she was the one letting Kelsey pay. It was the obvious decision.
“The house is nice, right?” May asked, as she neatly folded the final paper bag to set out with the recycling.
May knew that Lauren generally preferred hotels when she traveled. The first time she rented an Airbnb, a neighbor had called the police to report a trespasser. When Lauren told May about it, May responded too quickly, saying she “couldn’t believe anyone would do that” and lamenting what bad “luck” Lauren had had. Lauren replied under her breath that luck had nothing to do with it, then quickly changed the subject. That night after work, May googled vacation rentals racism and understood why Lauren avoided owner-operated rentals. Harassment from prying neighbors. Calls to the police. Claims by homeowners that the rental was suddenly unavailable, despite what the website clearly stated.
When Kelsey proposed renting a house in the Hamptons for a girls’ trip, May hadn’t wanted Lauren to feel boxed into an uncomfortable situation, so she suggested that hotel rooms would be less expensive than a whole house in the Hamptons. Kelsey insisted that they needed a place large enough to hang out and chill in private. She also offered to pay for the entire rental.
Checkmate. May was out of moves.
Lauren’s next text, sent only to May, followed seconds later. I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but please stop. Let her pay. It will be fine. Don’t overthink it.
The next day, Kelsey texted photos, saying she had the perfect place. Kind of small but right by this gorgeous bay beach. Out of curiosity, May had used a reverse Google image search to find the listing.
She was grateful Kelsey was footing the bill, because the rent was fifteen hundred dollars a night. It sounded impossibly expensive to May, but apparently the market warranted it. According to the rental listing, the house was booked solid for the entire summer, and the detailed home instructions left on the refrigerator by the owner—full of exclamation points and random all caps—gave a “FIRM!” checkout time because the house needed to be turned over immediately after their departure. The long list of prohibitions and rules ended with a handwritten note. Have a great stay, Callie!!! xox Arianna. The i in her name was dotted with a heart, and she left a contact number for emergencies.
Lauren’s and May’s phones simultaneously pinged with a new message on the Crew thread. It was a short video that began with the view of the wake behind a boat and ending with a glimpse of Kelsey, her long hair blowing wildly around her face as she squinted against the sunlight. She had added an animated sticker of a ferrryboat and the words Volume Up.
May unmuted her phone and heard “Let the River Run” by Carly Simon. She and Kelsey had watched Working Girl the summer after seventh grade and became obsessed with Melanie Griffith’s transformation from sneakers and a wall of permed hair to boss of the boardroom. Rewatching became a Wildwood annual tradition as they gathered a growing number of girls each summer in front of the communal television with hoards of snacks, reciting their favorite lines from memory. I’m not steak, you can’t just order me…I’ve got a mind for business and a bod for sin. And May’s personal favorite: Sometimes I sing and dance around the house in my underwear. Doesn’t make me Madonna.
Kelsey was driving down from Boston, which involved a ferry that would carry her first from southern Connecticut to Orient, then from Orient to Shelter Island, and then from Shelter Island to the South Fork of Suffolk County, aka the Hamptons.
May leaned in close to Lauren, snapped a selfie, and attached it to the group thread. Yay, you’re almost here! Can’t wait to see you! Send.
How’s the house? Kelsey asked.
May typed in five star emojis and hit enter, then quickly followed up with Thank you again for being so generous. What a treat.
Have you guys done the bee already?
Nope. We were saving it for you.
Yay. Let’s work on it while I’m on the ferry.
May responded with a thumbs-up and hit enter.
“Prosecco by the pool time?” Lauren asked.
As May slid open the back door to the deck, a thought suddenly came to her. “Do you think Arianna with all the refrigerator-note rules has cameras all over this house?”
Lauren laughed and shook her head. “Sometimes your brain terrifies me, May. You and that creepy imagination of yours really should write a book someday.”
The first sign of Kelsey’s arrival was a voice calling from inside the house. “Stash away the strap-on and get yourselves decent. I’m here!”
Lauren and May popped up from their chaise longues and headed for the kitchen, where they found Kelsey with a roller bag and an oversized straw tote embroidered with the words Beach Please. She wore slouchy denim overalls paired with a black tank top.
Lauren threw her arms around Kelsey. “You made it!”
When Lauren let go of Kelsey, it was May’s turn. Kelsey pulled her into a tight hug, rocking back and forth. The feeling was instantly familiar: Whatever nervousness May had been feeling about seeing Kelsey after so long melted on contact. Kelsey’s hugs always had that calming effect.
May remembered the first time they met. She was twelve years old and new to the camp, having landed a scholarship on her second try, but it was already Kelsey’s third summer at Wildwood, and they were assigned as bunkmates. Can I hug you? I feel like I already know you from your camp profile. May was initially suspect, thinking no one could possibly be that eager to know her, but within a few weeks it became clear that once Kelsey Ellis decided she was your friend, she really meant it.
“You must be exhausted from the drive,” May said.
“Friday afternoon in the Hamptons. Rookie error. I should have left Boston earlier. One of our flagship tenants in Downtown Crossing is pulling some shit with their lease renewal. They would never try a stunt like this with my father, so I’m determined to handle it myself. But—” She forced a smile and took a deep breath. “That is all totally whatever, and I’m just so happy we’re finally all here.”
Kelsey dropped her car keys on the kitchen island next to the open prosecco bottle. “Oh, man, you started the fun without me.”
“Barely,” Lauren assured her.
“So that means only one orgy in the pool so far?”
Kelsey had a unique talent for saying the most inappropriate things in a way that managed never to be off-putting. The one time she had accompanied May to Bloomington for spring break, she asked May’s mother out of the blue while clearing the dinner dishes what had happened between her and May’s father. When May’s mother tried to sidestep the question by saying it was so long ago, Kelsey said something about smart women learning how to “take care of themselves” and then made a humming sound.
May was mortified at the obvious vibrator reference, but then Coral Hanover did something she rarely did. She laughed—loudly—like an actual, full-belly laugh. By the end of the night, May’s mother had taken out an old photo album and shared the story of meeting Mitchell Hanover while she was getting her graduate degree at IU to become a teacher. How he had tried asking her out to dinner in Chinese, only to learn that her friend who had helped him study had taught him instead to say, “I am not very good at this.” How surprised she was to find herself in a relationship with an American from a small Midwestern town. How businesslike he was when she told him she was pregnant, immediately asking how far along she was to make sure it wasn’t too late to go to a clinic.
May’s father, her mother explained, had been excited to meet someone as “exotic” as her mother, but confessed that he could not imagine himself making a lifetime commitment to a woman who “wasn’t from here.” May knew the rest of the story. Her mother promised to raise the child alone as long as he married her long enough for her to obtain citizenship before they divorced. But until that night, May never realized the full extent of the mean-spiritedness beneath her father’s rejection of both May and her mother. It’s almost as if May’s mother needed Kelsey in the room as a buffer to tell the whole story.
Kelsey was looking at May now and smiling. “God, I can’t believe how long it’s been since I’ve actually seen you in person. I mean, it must have been at the wedding?”
No, it wasn’t the wedding. May remembered exactly when it was—eight years ago, not long before May left the law firm for the DA’s Office. She remembered because that was the beginning of the story of how she and Kelsey had stopped being friends.