Epilogue

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The Lofoten Islands, NorwayA month later

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The Lofoten Islands, Norway
A month later

My phone rings as I'm stirring the sauce for the meatballs. The gravy smells delicious. I accept the video call, holding the cell in my left hand while moving the wooden spoon in circular motions with my right.

"Cara?" I squint at the screen.

It takes me a solid minute to realize what I see is Cara's chin. She's gotten much better at video chats, but her camera never seems to know what to point at.

"Tarita, I have a problem," she says.

The image trembles, but then her entire face appears.

"Hi," I say. "What's wrong?"

Cara groans. "Look at this."

A brown stain covers half of her cheek. I bite my tongue to stop myself from laughing. "Did you try to contour?"

"That tutorial made it seem easy. But look at this. It's like I rolled in the mud, and I have a date soon."

I grab a glass of wine and pour half of it into the sauce. "A date? Who's he?"

"We met at the grocery store," Cara says. "He helped me reach the box of cereal Mason likes from the top shelf. We started talking, and he's smart, Tarita. Smart and with good assets."

A snort flies out of my mouth. I gulp the rest of the wine from the glass and get back to stirring.

"See? Being short isn't that bad. Okay," I go on, ignoring Cara's pout, "wipe it off with makeup remover and use just a tiny bit of product. Instead of dragging it all over your cheek, tap. With a brush or a wet sponge. Send me a picture when you're done."

"You have to teach me in person," Cara says. "And where's Basti?"

I glance across the open space living room-slash-kitchen over my shoulder. "Basti ran out of blue paints and went to pick up the ones he ordered from Oslo."

"And you're cooking like a wifey, Tarita," Cara says with a dreamy sigh.

"Basti can't cook to save his life. We can't live on his pancakes, delicious as they are. But he's trying, you know? He's just better at mixing paint than ingredients."

"Bless him. Poor thing," Cara says. "Okay, help me choose the lipstick, and then I'll leave you alone."

I turn off the stove and cover the pan with the lid. "The nude one. And use a lip liner."

Cara blows me a kiss, or more like gives the front camera of her phone a smooch since her lips take over the screen, and we hang up.

Ignoring the twinge of worry that settles in my gut when I see it's almost eight p.m., and he's been out for over three hours, I stroll to the dining table I'd set and rearrange the wine glasses and linen napkins.

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