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felt about dares—specifically, that you didn’t turn them down unless you were comfortable being branded a wuss.
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    “You mean, you’re turning down a dare?”
    I considered my options. I didn’t really have any, given that I didn’t want anyone to think I was a wuss, at least not about something like this. “No,” I said reluctantly, “I’m not turning down a dare.”
    “Forty-eight hours, then. No Diet Coke. In fact, how about no caffeine?”
    I gasped. “No caffeine?”
    “No caffeine. You wouldn’t want to do this halfway, would you?”
    “Yes, I would. I absolutely would.”
    “No caffeine,” he repeated firmly.
    “Why are you doing this to me?” I asked, forlorn.
    “Because I want you to live a long and healthy life.” He consulted his watch. “It’s ten o’clock.
    You only need to last until ten on Tuesday. It will be fun.”
    It was the second time that day Peter had declared something terrible would be fun, and it wasn’t even noon.
    Little did I know just how much less fun the day would get.

    At least Peter had been telling the truth about brunch. I believe strongly in eating frequently and in large quantities, but the Forrests made me feel positively ascetic. There were scrambled eggs and crisp bacon on china platters, warm scones and croissants in a basket, sliced melon and berries in a glass bowl, and a pitcher of fresh-squeezed orange juice.
    Of course, nothing goes with bacon quite as well as Diet Coke, but I tried not to think about that. I’d read somewhere that it took smokers three days for their physical addiction to nicotine to pass. Caffeine couldn’t be nearly as addictive as smoking. I was starting to feel a little shaky and had the beginning of a headache, but I assured myself the cravings would last only a few hours at the most. When Susan offered me a soda, I politely demurred and asked for herbal tea instead, feeling superlatively normal. But even with a generous dollop of honey, the tea lacked the stimulating kick of Diet Coke. I glanced up at the clock. Only forty-seven hours to go.
    We ate in the cozy breakfast room, chatting about the party as we passed around sections of the paper. We were discussing potential outings for the day when I heard my cell phone ringing from up in Peter’s bedroom. Years of Winslow, Brown partners phoning at odd hours had instilled a Pavlovian response to that sound, and I jerked up automatically. But, as my mother frequently reminded me, it wasn’t polite to take calls during a meal. That never dissuaded me in the presence of my own family, but while it was one thing to be impolite to my mother, it was another thing entirely to be impolite to somebody else’s, particularly Peter’s. I sat back down.
    “Don’t you want to get that?” Peter asked.
    “It can wait,” I said.
    “What if it’s work?” he asked.
    “It can still wait,” I said again. Officially, I was on vacation, having taken off the Friday and Monday surrounding the weekend, and I’d put in a superhuman effort before I left to make sure I was fully caught up on the deals and projects I had underway. Nobody from Winslow, Brown should be calling, but that didn’t guarantee anything. People in my line of work adhered closely to the saying that time-is-money, and the partners tended to view my time as their money. Not a single one of my vacations had gone uninterrupted since I’d started at the firm.
    “Are you sure, dear?” asked Susan.
    “I’m sure,” I said, resolute.
    The ringing finally stopped, but a moment later Peter’s own cell phone trilled from upstairs. He twitched. “Do you want to get that, honey?” his mother asked.
    “If Rachel can wait, I can wait,” he said stolidly.
    Peter’s phone had barely stopped ringing when mine started ringing again. Then his started ringing again, too.
    “Somebody must really want to get a hold of you kids,” commented Charles. We were all silent Page 12

    as we listened to the alternating rings from