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“I told you so isn’t a good look, brother.”
“You should be happy. You don’t have to worry about Mom anymore.”
“For now.” She was always going to worry about her mother. She was always going to feel responsible for her. That wasn’t something she could just get over. But maybe she could try worrying a little bit less.
“How’s everything else going?” Eric asked. “You and Jinny make up yet?”
Esther leaned back and propped her feet up on the coffee table. “Yeah, actually, we did.”
“I knew you would.”
She didn’t tell him she’d taken his advice, because he was already being insufferably smug. She refused to give him the satisfaction.
“What about work?” he asked. “You’re not still thinking of transferring, are you?”
“No, work’s going better. I got praised by one of the team leads to the project manager today.”
“Hey, congratulations. That’s great.”
“Yeah, it is.”
“Sounds like everything’s unicorns and rainbows. Funny how fast things can turn around, huh?”
“Yeah. Funny.” Esther thought about Jonathan, the one thing that hadn’t gotten better, and wouldn’t.
“What about the guy?” Eric asked, like he could read her mind.
“There is no guy.” She really needed people to stop asking her about Jonathan. It was making it harder to get over him.
“The neighbor. You know, the one you and Jinny were fighting over.”
“We weren’t fighting over him,” she said a little too forcefully. “He’s a non-issue.”
“You sure about that?”
“Yes, I’m sure.” He was out of her life. It would be a lot easier to accept that and move on if everyone would stop bringing him up. She didn’t want to have to think about him anymore.
“If you say so.”
She said so.
Chapter Thirty
“It says here, your best nude lipstick shade is the color of your nipples.” Jinny was at Esther’s place again, lying on the couch flipping through an InStyle magazine as thick as a textbook.
Esther was folding laundry on the dining table. “You know what I’ve never done? Seriously contemplated the color of my nipples.”
“Kind of hard to test in the store, I’ll admit.” Jinny reached for the Frappuccino she’d brought with her. It was the same pinkish-purple color as her nails, and it looked disgusting.
The timer on Esther’s phone went off. “That’s the last load.” They were going out for drinks as soon as Esther’s laundry was done, and then meeting Yemi for dinner later, after he was done helping his parents around the house.
Jinny waved her off, sucking noisily on her straw.
Esther grabbed her laundry basket and headed downstairs. Tonight would be her first time going out with Jinny and Yemi since they’d started dating. Her first time officially being the third wheel to their perfect happy couple. She wasn’t nervous about it, exactly—she knew it would be fine. But she was glad she and Jinny were pre-gaming before they met up with Yemi. The alcohol would help smooth over any awkwardness that might present itself.
She got waylaid by Mrs. Boorstein in the courtyard, so it was fifteen minutes later when Esther let herself back into the apartment. Jinny was sitting on the couch reading Jonathan’s screenplay.
Esther stopped in her tracks. “Where did you find that?”
