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Phoebe, who was working the cheese-dipped-pretzel table and successfully keeping a mob of very impatient, very hungry people on the verge of heatstroke happy. Max smiles at the memory of launching into her pitch on the growth opportunity at Ex, Inc., and how Phoebe cut her off to say that as long as the gig did not involve melting or dipping, Max had her at hello.
    “The doctor is in ,” Max says, reciting the sign on Lucy’s booth, forcing herself to stop procrastinating.
    Okay, Bridget. Bridget, Bridget, Bridget … She rests her neck on the cool porcelain rim, closes her eyes, and chews … hoping Bridget is sleeping dreamlessly. In the stillness, Bridget’s pain makes Max’s own chest constrict, conjuring the ghost imprint of her own elephantine heartbreak. Max redirects her mind to speculate what this redheaded Taylor is doing right about now … fist-bumping some dude … sports drinks in their hands … carefree grins on their faces—
    The buzzer rings and the water sloshes as Max sits forward, crust clenched in her teeth.
    She leaps up, drops it in the box, throws on her big terry cloth robe, and wraps her long, brown hair in a towel. “Coming!” she cries as the buzzer rings again. She unlocks the door and sticks her head up under the stoop. “Hello?”
    A tall, dark-haired guy in a navy-blue jumpsuit appears. Not at all what she expected. “Cooper Baby,” he says gamely.
    “I’m sorry?”
    “Delivery from Cooper Baby. You ordered a crib?”
    “Yes.” Realizing in the oversized robe she could be a Teen Mom episode, Max gestures to the stoop above her. “Um, I didn’t. My mother did. Can you carry it? The nursery’s on the second floor.”
    “No problem.” He retreats to the sidewalk, where the large carton is strapped to a handcart.
    “Hold on—let me lock this door and run up and let you in.”
    Seventeen-year-old Ben Cooper huffs the handcart up the steps, trying to make it appear easy and effortless. Usually he doesn’t care what it looks like when he makes his dad’s deliveries, but usually he is trailing a very pregnant woman, perhaps he himself is trailed by a toddler or two. But that is the extent of who observes his after-school job. Not once has anyone close to his age factored into his rounds. For the first time he finds himself wishing he hadn’t worn the jumpsuit.
    As Max waits for him to bump the box up the stairs, she should be wishing she hadn’t grabbed her mother’s old robe, but instead is so distracted by the texts coming in from Zach as he scrubs Bridget’s laptop, that she is unaware of the boy-ness of this boy. Right now he is just representing yet another odd and uncomfortable thing she has to do for her mother’s new life.
    “So where do you want it?” Ben asks as he wheels the box along the second-floor landing past her mom and Peter’s bathroom.
    “The yellow room.” She points.
    “With the teddy bear border? Yeah, I figured. I meant in the space.”
    “Oh. Um, do I have to decide?” Max asks as she flips on the overhead light.
    “No. It’s easy to slide around once it’s assembled.” He lowers it to the yellow carpet, slips a box cutter from his back pocket, and starts slicing the packaging apart. Max hops up on the dresser and tips off her turban, her wet hair flopping down her back.
    Ben is suddenly nervous. Which is stupid because he could put a crib together in his sleep. Which is a skill he will do what with in life, he has no clue. If his dad has his way, Ben’ll come back from college and be the third generation to run Cooper Baby. But Ben has to believe his life is going to be more than keeping up with the latest-model diaper pail.
    “Do you know what you’re doing?” Max asks as the thing he’s building in front of her is starting to look more like a small cage than a sleep spot.
    “Um, I—uh—never assembled this brand before. It’s new. I was kind of following what I’ve done before with other models.”
    “So you’re having