The following morning, I head downstairs to look for my sister’s car. Our apartment building doesn’t have any parking spots – it was built before they required that sort of thing – so there’s only street parking. In the morning and afternoons, there’s usually an ample amount of parking, but it starts to dwindle as people get home after work. Because Lila gets home around three or four in the morning, she’s forced to park three or four streets away. But because she almost always gets home a little tipsy and/or tired, she almost never remembers where she parked the car. Usually, this is her problem, but today, since she’s kind enough to let me borrow her car for work, it’s my problem. I leave the apartment half an hour early, just in case it takes me much longer to find the car that I think, and I finally find it forty-five minutes later, five blocks away.

I’m about to give up when I finally see the 2001 Honda Civic with the front driver’s side smashed in. Elated, I open the passenger side and get in. I climb over the gear shift and the cup holders and into the driver’s side. This is the only way to get in. This happened a few years ago, when Lila was just laid off and she was completely broke. Someone had backed into her car while it was parked on the street. The insurance company gave her $800 for the damage, but because her account was overdrawn after she paid rent that month and she had no money for food, she used the money to live on instead of getting the door fixed. It has been this way ever since.

I adjust my seat and make sure that the rear view and side mirrors are in the right position. I turn on the radio, but nothing comes out. That’s right, the radio doesn’t work either. Perfect. What a piece of shit car. Let’s just hope that it gets me to North Hollywood in one piece.

My phone rings. It’s a strange number. I usually don’t pick up unknown numbers, but for some reason this time I do.

“Hello?”

“Hello, Chloe! This is Dolly Monroe. How are you?” Dolly’s accent, which I later found out is from West Texas, makes her sound like she’s cooing like a bird. It’s so sing-songy.

“Hi Dolly. I’m fine,” I say. I put her on speaker, pull out of the parking spot and head toward Sunset Boulevard.

“What are you doing Saturday night?” she asks.

“Um…I don’t know. I don’t really have plans.”

I try to think of what I have planned for the weekend. The beginning of this week has been so crazy and hectic that my brain fogs up.

“You do now! I found the perfect date for you. You two will get along splendidly. The only thing is that it’s a formal event. Do you have any formal clothes?”

“Wait, what?” My mind tries to catch up with the trunk load of information that she just unloaded on me.

“Do you have any evening dresses?”

“No. But wait, back up. I can’t go on a date this weekend.”

“Why?”

“Because…because,” I search my mind for an answer. But nothing comes to mind. “I don’t know. I just can’t. It’s too soon.”

“You said you were free. You have nothing to worry about. No pressure. This guy is really easy going. Very attractive. And pretty loaded too.”

“I don’t care about that,” I say.

“Even better.”

“But I still can’t go.”

“Why not?” she asks. Is she totally dense? Or is she just not getting the hint?

“I just can’t,” I say. “I’m not ready.”

“Chloe, how long has it been since your last date?” she asks. I take a moment to really think about this. Hmm. Come to think of it. I can’t really remember. I don’t know.

“That pause tells me that it has been too long. So this Saturday is going to fix that.”

“But…”

“There’s no buts. He’s a great guy. Very nice, courteous. Interesting. I’m sure that you two will get along splendidly.”

“But you don’t even know me,” I finally come up with a good reason. That’s right. She hardly knows a thing about me. How can she be so sure that we’re a good match?

“Chloe, what I do is not about knowledge. It’s not about information. People make connections based on chemistry, and I make my recommendations based on intuition. I learned a long time ago to listen to my intuition, and it’s very rarely wrong.”

“Okay,” I finally give in.

“Okay? You’ll go.” Dolly’s voice goes up at the end. She’s getting a little bit too excited about this.

“Yes, I’ll go,” I say. “But why can’t we just go out for a cup of coffee? Get to know each other a little? I can’t go a black tie event with a complete stranger.”

“Eh, of course, you can!” I can almost see her waving her manicured hand at me dismissively, as if that is such an usual statement to make.

“Fine. But I don’t have anything to wear.”

“I’ll fix that.”

After carefully negotiating a time that would work with both of our schedules, we decide to meet on Rodeo Drive at 6 o’clock tonight. I hang up the phone with plenty of doubts and a touch of resignation. Maybe Dolly’s right. It’s time to go out there and meet some new people.