It’s four-thirty on a Thursday afternoon, and Julie Evans, who has been my best friend since we were seven and barely conscious of what being a best friend meant, has confessed she is living a lie.

“No, I said we are living a lie,” Julie clarifies.

“What’s the difference?” I ask. “Aren’t you part of us?”

We are facing off across the four feet of purple carpet between Julie’s desk and her bed, wrapped in the dull grey glow of light filtered through clouds sulking outside her window. A thousand small mementos are pinned to the wall behind her, reminding us just how much of ourselves we have anchored in each other. There is the program from Wicked, the first musical she persuaded me to come with her to see, and the certificate of proficiency from the ghost hunting class we enrolled in to celebrate my thirteenth birthday. There we are at seven, nine, twelve, fourteen, taller and older, changing around the edges—my braces, her glasses—but always connected: my hand on her shoulder, her arm around my waist, our bare feet braced against each other on the grass. More often than not, I am grinning like the after shot in a Sunday morning infomercial, while Julie’s expression is more enigmatic—distracted, sheepish, squinting into the sun...