There was something so encouraging about a hardware store on a Saturday morning. In every bin, on every rack, and along every aisle, a solution presented itself—you just had to know who to ask and where to look. Kate found Holloway’s particularly soothing because her parents had DIYed their way through the ’90s, and so she could anticipate the happy jangle of the bell above the door and instinctively knew which floorboards creaked in the shop where she’d spent much of her childhood, sitting cross-legged and building castles out of copper washers, while her parents debated paint samples and wood finishes.
Gus and Gertie Holloway were comically garrulous siblings in their early sixties with the same wiry bowl cut of gray hair. They’d inherited the shop from their parents forty years earlier and it was rare to see only one of them wearing denim overalls over a green Holloway’s Hardware T-shirt. Contrary to any stranger’s cursory glance, they weren’t twins—Gertie was a year older and don’t you forget it—but they preferred the same unofficial uniform along with black thick-framed glasses that they’d been tickled to learn were currently considered “hip.”
Now that Kate was living with such responsible, initiative-taking housemates—her parents—she rarely had a reason to visit the hardware store, but they’d asked her to grab a new lightbulb for Roy before her shift at the Jetty Bar that night. The yellow-slickered sea captain lamp in the living room was the fifth member of the family, and Roy’s permanent look of intense consternation—did he see whitecaps ahead or something more existential?—provided the Campbells with endless amusement. Growing up, Roy had served as the family therapist—“Have you talked to Roy about your science test?”—as well as the family mediator—“Go talk to Roy about your allowance.” Kate had told her parents that, yes, she could pick up some lightbulbs because even between her two jobs, she needed more distractions if she was ever going to stop stalking Thomas’s new girlfriend online.
In the past month, since Thomas’s phone call, whenever Kate talked herself into googling Wally Moffett like an addict justifying one last hit, she would emerge from the dank quagmire hours later feeling not only sick but physically battered. Among her many irrelevant findings, Kate had learned that Wally loved to watch YouTube videos of household cleaning tricks. Across her online platforms, she’d consistently listed “discovering innovative and organic cleaning hacks” as her favorite hobby. So that was a thing. It felt like a win for Kate until she remembered all the times Thomas had counted up her water glasses, one on each surface in the apartment, and balked, “Would it kill you to be a little neater?”
Kate pulled into the Holloway’s Hardware parking lot five minutes after they opened. Smiling at the familiar sound of the bell above the glass door, she froze in her tracks at the sound of yelling: “Oh for Pete’s sakes, how many times do I have to tell you!”
“It’s unsanitary!” Gertie yelled at her brother from her post at the cash register, where she was scanning SKU numbers on half a dozen red mailboxes.
“But it’s not a cat colony!” Gus insisted, his hands in fists. “It’s a cat community!”
Kate tried to stifle her laugh as she backed toward the door but the bickering siblings whipped around. Much to Kate’s delight, they were wearing their matching overalls.
“Kate,” Gertie appealed, “will you please tell my Looney Tunes brother that his cat colony is out of control?”
Gus lived next door to Kate’s parents on a secluded triple lot, well hidden by wild shrubbery and massive trees. Years earlier, he’d towed a defunct, rusty school bus into his backyard and set up a bunker for cats he’d rescued.
“Listen to me,” Gus said, abandoning the paint-mixing station and walking toward Kate, “a colony is a place run by a foreign ruling power—we can all agree to that, right?” Kate nodded with reluctance. “But cats have been in Sea Point longer than we have, and they’re all fixed, so no one is getting knocked up.” Raising his voice over Gertie’s cackling, Gus continued. “It’s a sustainable situation and, more importantly, it’s a community. It’s consensual. If the cats don’t like it, they can leave, but I think it’s pretty clear that they appreciate being part of a collective.”
“Well, you’ve got at least one raccoon in your collective,” Gertie sighed before turning back to Kate. “What do you need, honey?”
“Lightbulbs.”
“Second aisle, halfway down on your right.”
Gertie was the go-getter, the businesswoman who made sure people shopped at Holloway’s and publicly shamed those who had their hardware needs shipped from the Internet. She lived above the store and made the rounds at Sea Point’s bars and hotels, giving business to get business.
Gus preferred to work in the back with the paints. The fact that he knew Kate’s name was a bragging right since Gus chose to ignore most patrons including, infamously, Sea Point’s mayor—the cringey footage of which had briefly trended on Twitter. Shy with a bit of a stutter, Gus didn’t like many people, but he sure did love his cats.
The door chimed, signaling the entrance of another customer as Kate wound her way around to the front of the store. She smiled as she handed her lightbulbs to Gertie and saw Ziggy fiddling with something near the register. “It always smells so good in here,” she said wistfully, giving Ziggy a nod hello.
“Like wood and topsoil and Gus’s stinky farts?” Gertie asked.
“I heard that,” Gus yelled over. “And you’re a child.”
“Did your folks get that letter from Leeper?” Gertie asked as she scanned the lightbulbs.
“What letter?”
Smacking her lips and rolling her eyes, Gertie explained. “Our dear friend Mr. Leeper wrote a letter oh-so generously offering to buy our parents’ house—the one Gus lives in, on the triple lot.”
“Wait, what?” Ziggy asked.
Gertie continued: “Apparently everyone on the block got one of these Leeper letters, and you know, he’s offering just enough to make people really consider. He’s an asshole, but he’s not an idiot.”
“My parents haven’t mentioned it,” Kate said, grabbing her lightbulbs and slowly walking toward the door. “They’d never sell to Leeper, anyway.”
“Me neither!” Gertie declared. “I may hate Gus’s cat colony but I hate Leeper infinitely more. What about your mom, Ziggy? Has she mentioned anything?”
Gus walked over from his paint-mixing station without saying a word. Closing the space between him and Ziggy, Gus asked with a solemnity usually reserved for feline urinary tract infections, “How’s she doing?”
Ziggy shrugged. “Hanging in there.”
“She’s one of my favorite customers, you know.”
“We all know,” Gertie yelled over from the cash register.
Gus ignored his sister and spoke to Ziggy and Kate. “Beverly—she comes in here, and she basically knows what she wants. But when she’s narrowed it down to two choices and can’t make the call, she asks for my help. I assist her, we talk about the profile of each paint option, we reach a decision, and then she leaves.”
“Great story,” Gertie said, breathing on her glasses before polishing the lenses on the sleeve of her T-shirt.
“That’s probably my favorite thing about your mom,” Gus said, using a paint mixing stick to poke Ziggy square in the chest. “She doesn’t linger like most people. She knows when it’s time to go.”
“Speaking of which,” Ziggy said, taking a step back from Gus, “I should get going.”
“Yeah, me too,” Kate piggybacked, waving goodbye to Gertie.
Exiting Holloway’s together, Ziggy asked Kate about her plan for the day.
“Pretty packed schedule until my shift at Jetty Bar—I have to stalk my ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend while listening to John Mayer.”
Ziggy nodded as if this was the answer he’d expected, such were the common symptoms of Kate’s affliction. “Didn’t you and Georgina used to make fun of John Mayer?”
“It’s part of the masochism.”
Ziggy grinned, and just as Kate wondered why she hadn’t seen him all week, he announced, “Miles is back and we’re going out tonight. Wanna come?”
“Like, out?” Kate asked. She hadn’t been out since the night before Thomas dumped her. The idea of drinking outside of her house seemed exhausting. “I have to work.”
Ziggy squinted at her, trying to x-ray her thoughts. “Can you ask Jerry to cover? It might be good to get out.” At Kate’s hesitation, he added, “Plus, my dad died.”
“You’re sick,” Kate said.
“I bet Jerry would appreciate the offer,” Ziggy continued, ignoring Kate’s diagnosis. “It’s a Saturday night—it’ll be worth his time—especially since it’s the last Saturday night of Wharflandia. They’re moving all the hot tubs from the dock on Monday to get ready for Memorial Day Weekend.”
Kate knew Ziggy was right, but it seemed impossible to already ask for a shift swap. After she nodded ever so slightly, Ziggy grinned and gently patted her on the shoulder as if more physical contact might break her. “I’ll text you but probably around eight—it’ll be a drive-off instead of a walk-off. Or maybe a drink-off? We’ll see.”
“Can’t wait,” Kate said, tossing the lightbulbs into the passenger seat and wondering what Roy would make of all this.
After Jerry had texted back saying he’d happily cover her shift, Kate settled into the worn corner nook of the living room couch for an afternoon of reading under Roy’s fresh light. Among the few perks Kate had discovered since beginning her job at the library, perhaps her favorite was the fact that she was able to preview books before their publication. Lauded editors at all the major publishing houses wrote letters and sent Advanced Reader Copies (ARCs) to librarians around the country in the hopes of generating buzz, landing their projects on each season’s Must-Read list, and positioning their books face out on every library display table.
Those publishing houses, which still loomed large in Kate’s mind with the gilded mythology of an unattained dream, now needed Kate the way democracy needed voters in order to succeed. Although she was just one of thousands of library associates in the country, she had the power to make a difference in a book’s fate. She could encourage a patron to pick up a debut memoir—or guide them to an established novelist, a commercial thriller, or a provocative collection of essays. Librarians had steering power, Kate realized, and connecting readers to their new favorite book was the strongest intellectual high she had experienced since working with her college thesis adviser.
Turning the page of the ARC, Kate found herself wondering what she should wear for her night out with Ziggy and Miles Hoffman. She couldn’t think of Miles without saying his whole name, like he was a movie star or a band. A dress seemed aggressive, like she was trying too hard, but she needed to compensate for her return to Sea Point. Of course, Miles Hoffman would be a hypocrite to judge Kate since he was also in town, but rich kids could afford to live within all sorts of contradictions.
Ziggy texted at four to say to meet him outside at eight and to wear a bathing suit. After replying with a green nauseated face, Kate returned to her book and read the same paragraph three times before giving up. Her nerves were winning and required distraction. Climbing the stairs, Kate decided to excise her anxiety with a few run-throughs of Freaky Freakazoid. She got in position, forced a smile, and let the beat drop.
At 7:59 p.m., Ziggy was outside when Kate closed her front door. “You’re early!” she shouted, walking toward him. She’d settled on a simple black dress she’d borrowed from Bernadette—or, rather, that Bernadette had forgotten in Kate’s apartment when she’d come up to New York to visit. Four years ago.
“On time is late,” Ziggy replied, which struck Kate as a Zeke-ism. The bright lights of Miles Hoffman’s car zoomed up in front of the Miller driveway just then, hip-hop blasting so loud that Kate felt her ribs ricochet. It took her a moment to realize it wasn’t actually the music’s volume that made her body shake, but that the current scene had trip-wired a long-buried memory.
On a Friday night her junior year of high school, Kate had waited on her front steps for Georgina to pick her up. In the dark, she heard the cacophony of teenage testosterone battling for airspace before she saw the group of boys emerge from Ziggy’s house, laughing and playing a game, which Kate quickly identified as Marry, Chuck, Fuck. In an inexplicable, cruel twist of timing and fate, the boys loaded into a red Jeep just as Miles declared at an oblivious volume, “That’s too easy: Fuck Princess Leia, Marry Ms. Gilmore.” In the slow motion of a bad ’80s movie, Kate watched Miles under the streetlamp throw a head nod in the direction of her own house. “And chuck Ziggy’s snobby little ginger neighbor.”
Now, seventeen years later, Kate lifted her hand to wave at the convertible idling in front of her, and Miles Hoffman gave her a wave back. “Hi!” Kate yelled, half a second after Miles had turned down the stereo volume with the practiced wrist flick of a devout SoulCyclist. He could slice a pizza with the blade of his jawline, and she was suddenly sixteen and chuck-able. But then, much to Kate’s surprise, Miles threw the sports car into park and hopped out. He ran around the hood in a goofy, elbows-out jog, to give her a hug.
“Kate Campbell! Great to see you!” he said, taking a step back but keeping his eyes locked on hers. “I’m glad we get to catch up.”
Kate wasn’t sure how one caught up with someone they’d never really known in the first place, but he sounded genuine. Her body thrummed from the warmth of his gaze before she realized the charm was real. Miles Hoffman could fly out to Los Angeles tonight and land a movie contract tomorrow while the plane was still taxiing. His features were so startlingly cohesive—each asset highlighted every other, so that Kate found herself admiring his earlobes, which looked so supple and buttery, and created such an exquisite contrast from his dark five-o’clock shadow.
As Miles teased Ziggy for his oversize bathing suit, Kate studied his profile and decided he could succeed anywhere with that beautiful mug of his. But he was here, with her, in Sea Point, and that fact not only justified Kate’s nerves all afternoon but also made the whole evening ahead of them sparkle like a compliment.
“Dude,” Ziggy said, staring at Miles’s car, “what are you driving?”
Miles rolled his eyes. “Just renting but yeah, they sweet-talked me. It’s a cabriolet. A Porsche cabriolet.”
“Interesting,” Ziggy said, leaning over the convertible to stroke the leather interior. “Because it looks like a premature midlife crisis.”
Kate felt a strange rattling emerge from the base of her throat and realized she was laughing. How long had it been since she’d laughed like that? And then Miles Hoffman did the most remarkable thing: He beamed at her. If the rug pulled the room together in The Big Lebowski, Miles Hoffman’s true smile pulled his face together in a devastating and unjust way. He was cruelly beautiful.
“I’ve got the cab,” Miles said, scrolling through his phone and placing the call. “Summersault or straight to Wharflandia?”
“Let’s Summersault first,” Ziggy said definitively. Kate opened her mouth to say she’d rather not go to Wharflandia at all since she’d asked Jerry to cover her shift, but she stayed quiet. The less she said now, the better. She wanted Miles to like her, and men like Miles liked women who spoke seldom—Kate knew because she’d dated a man like Miles for twelve years.
When the cab arrived, the three of them piled in, Miles volunteering to sit up front since he was the tallest. He immediately began to flirt with the fifty-something-year-old driver, who turned out to be the mother of a girl with whom Kate had attended Sea Point High. As Miles asked the driver what she did for fun, Ziggy turned to Kate in the backseat. “How was your day, post-Holloway’s?” he asked. Kate silently thanked him for not mentioning her plan to stalk Wally in front of Miles.
“It was good,” she offered. “What have you guys been up to all week?” She hoped that Ziggy didn’t notice how closely she’d tracked the direct correlation between the days since Miles had arrived home and the nights since Ziggy had reached out for a walk-off.
“I’ve been mostly working,” Ziggy said. “But we did get up to the Pine Barrens a couple of days ago.”
“I forgot how special that place is,” Miles added, turning around in his seat and leaning unnecessarily close to the driver as he looked at Kate. In the near dark, his brown eyes still glimmered with light. “It’s amazing how undiscovered it is.”
Kate thought of Thomas and his friends during that dinner in Mexico, the debate about undiscovered vacation destinations, and their derisive chortling about New Jersey. She’d never learned the origin of their inside joke about “inverted,” but who cared? Suddenly Thomas and his “chosen family” seemed far away and miserable.