Page 39 of Last Fall

I wondered how long it would be before I got a reply. My writing group was pretty much always connected online, sharing personal details about our lives as much as we discussed our work. But without fail, the moment anyone had big, big news, everyone else would be busy and away from theircomputers.

Sure enough, five minutes passed before I got my firstreply.

Julia:Please tell me this iscastingnews!

Lindsay:Are you watchingThe Price of Loveagain? (Please say this iscastingnews!)

I waited another thirty seconds just to be cruel, thentyped:

Me: CASTING NEWS! Nothing solid yet. They’re “checkingavailability.”

I got a lot of screamface emojis sent my way from everyone and the messages started coming in fast. I relayed my phone call with Maggie in excruciating detail because—shocker here—writers like to know everything.What were you feeling? What do you think she reallymeant?

Alexandra:This means champagne in two weeks! Wait, not even! Just overaweek!

We had a writing retreat at a beach house just south of Tampa in nine days (not that I was counting.) Some of us were signing at a reader event nearby and since we all enjoyed a good reason to be together (for business purposes of course) we booked a nice big house on the gulf and three solid days ofwritingtime.

I couldn’t wait. My relationship with these six women would always be unique and special. Like a secret sisterhood. You kind of had to be in it to really understand all the secrets thatboundus.

And my goodness did we havesecrets.