CLAIRE AND I were sitting up in her bed that night after our outing at Susie’s, having a two-girl pajama party. Edmund was on tour with the San Francisco Symphony, and Claire had said, “I really, really don’t want to go into labor¹ here all by myself alone, girlfriend.”

  I looked over at her, lying in the huge divot she’d made in her memory-foam mattress² with her rotund 260 pounds.

  “I can’t get any bigger,” she said. “It’s not possible. I wasn’t this big with two boys, so how can this little girl-child turn me into the blimp that ate the planet?”

  I laughed, thinking it was possible that when she’d had her first baby twenty years ago, she was a few sizes smaller than when she’d conceived Ruby³ Rose, but I didn’t say so.

  “What can I get you?” I asked.

  “Anything in the freezer compartment,” Claire said.

  “Copy that,” I said, grinning at her. I returned with a carton of Chunky Monkey and two spoons, climbed back into the bed, saying, “It’s cruel to call an ice cream Chunky Monkey when that’s what it turns you into.”

  Claire cackled, pried⁴ off the lid, and as we took turns dipping our spoons in, she said to me, “So how’s it going with you and Joe?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Living together, you idiot. Are you thinking of getting seriously hooked up? As in married?”

  “I like the way you kind of edge into a subject.”

  “Hell. You’re not such a subtle creature yourself.”

  I tipped my spoon in her direction - touché, my friend - then I started talking. Claire knew most of it: about my failed marriage, about my love affair with Chris, who’d been shot dead in the line of duty. And I talked about my sister, Cat, divorced with two young kids, holding down a big job, and having a bitter relationship with her ex.

  “Then I look at you, Butterfly,” I said. “In your grown-up four-bedroom house. And you have your darling husband, two great kids off into the world, and now you have the guts

点击收听单词发音  

1 labor
n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦
参考例句：
We are never late in satisfying him for his labor.我们从不延误付给他劳动报酬。 He was completely spent after two weeks of hard labor.艰苦劳动两周后，他已经疲惫不堪了。

2 mattress
n.床垫，床褥
参考例句：
The straw mattress needs to be aired.草垫子该晾一晾了。 The new mattress I bought sags in the middle.我买的新床垫中间陷了下去。

3 ruby
n.红宝石，红宝石色
参考例句：
She is wearing a small ruby earring.她戴着一枚红宝石小耳环。 On the handle of his sword sat the biggest ruby in the world.他的剑柄上镶有一颗世上最大的红宝石。

4 pried
v.打听，刺探（他人的私事）( pry的过去式和过去分词 )；撬开
参考例句：
We pried open the locked door with an iron bar. 我们用铁棍把锁着的门撬开。 来自《简明英汉词典》 So Tom pried his mouth open and poured down the Pain-killer. 因此汤姆撬开它的嘴，把止痛药灌下去。 来自英汉文学 - 汤姆历险

5 guts
v.狼吞虎咽，贪婪地吃，飞碟游戏（比赛双方每组5人，相距15码，互相掷接飞碟）；毁坏（建筑物等）的内部( gut的第三人称单数 )；取出…的内脏n.勇气( gut的名词复数 )；内脏；消化道的下段；肠
参考例句：
I'll only cook fish if the guts have been removed. 鱼若已收拾干净，我只需烧一下即可。 Barbara hasn't got the guts to leave her mother. 巴巴拉没有勇气离开她妈妈。 来自《简明英汉词典》