The next day I bought a cute thank you card with a bashful bear holding a bunch of flowers on it and dropped it into his mailbox. I never heard or saw him. I was also gratified to note there were no more sexual noises coming from the other side of the wall. He had either moved his bed, or he hadn’t brought anyone home. For reasons unknown, I found myself hoping it was the second option.

The first day back at work was the hardest, but I realized all I had to do to carry on as normal was keep away from Josh altogether. I found I had a great talent for it. In fact, it was quite amazing how many excuses I came up with to avoid him. I’d even started wearing headphones at my desk, just so the sound of his voice didn’t turn my stomach. What a shame I couldn’t get paid for avoiding Josh.

Incredible to think that there was a time when I was a master at inventing reasons to visit his office. How much effort I used to put into it. Dropping off papers, printing out reports rather than emailing them, even carrying random file folders into his lair just so I’d have an excuse if anybody saw me walking in.

Every time it had gotten to be a little much throughout the week, I’d remind myself that brunch at Megan’s was only days away. It would just be the two of us and a couple of her friends from work. Nice girls who sort of drifted in and out of our weekly tradition depending on their plans. It was one of my constants, a way to decompress after a long week. And if there had ever been a long one, this was it.

I woke up on Saturday morning and felt pleased with myself. I had survived a whole working week and to be honest, it had not been too difficult. My work performance had not suffered either. In fact, Tracee had complimented me on one of my reports. In my mind, Josh had already become history.

Dressing in a white sweater, white jeans, and a dainty pair of pink butterfly sandals, I set off for the bakery around the corner from me.

“I’ll have that coffee cake, please,” I said, pointing to the last cake in the glass case. Thank God, I’d come in when I did because at least fifteen people had come up behind me to join the queue. No way would the bakery’s legendary coffee not been snapped up by the time the line cleared up, not on a Saturday morning, anyway. I’d be the heroine of our brunch at Megan’s.

I watched the girl behind the counter carefully put the cake into their distinctive purple box. A couple of moist, golden brown crumbs that were stuck to the utensil she used to move the cake dropped to the counter and lay there. Seductively. As if they were daring me to lick them off. This was cake porn at its finest. The girl, who was obviously a monster, wiped the lovely crumbs off with a dishcloth.

I transferred my lust to the cake in the box. It looked so good for a whole second I considered taking it home and having it all for myself. It would be worth the hours of toil at the gym as penance, not to mention Megan’s disappointment. I watched the woman close the box and tie a purple ribbon around it.

Just then, as though Megan had read my mind, she texted me.

You’d better bring that coffee cake, lady. I swear I’ll come around and search your apartment for it if you tell me they’ve run out.

Oh, well. There went that idea. I replied:

Got the last one! You may start raising money for the statue in my honor.

Carrying the bakery box by the ribbon, I elbowed my way to the door. Already, I was scanning the street for an available cab through the store’s plate-glass windows. On a chilly Saturday morning, it usually wasn’t easy to find one. We were in that time of year when nobody was quite used to the cooler temperatures yet and wanted to get into a warm car as quickly as possible. If we got to sixty degrees in January, on the other hand, the sidewalk would be thick with people jogging in t-shirts and shorts. Funny how that worked.

I looked down the length of the crowded street, hoping to spot a cab when my heart started fluttering. I recognized the dark hair, square jaw, and the broad shoulders. He seemed to leap out from the sea of mere mortals he walked among.

Oh shit!

I had, through a carefully thought-out schedule, managed to avoid running into him at our building, but of course, I would have to meet him on the street with a million other people. Just my luck.

Still, there was no guarantee he had noticed me. I was one of dozens of people on the sidewalk. I decided to play it off like I hadn’t noticed him as if I had way too many things on my mind to see him. Even if he was easily the most glorious thing in my line of sight. I kept walking, head held high as I scanned the street for a cab, still holding onto my coffee cake. Nobody could say my priorities weren’t intact.

“Mimi!”

I froze in horror. That wasn’t the voice I had expected to hear. All of a sudden, I realized Max was the least of my worries. I turned to find Josh striding toward me, an idiotic smile on his face. How could I ever have thought he was handsome? Oh, God, I actually slept with him. I needed to have my head examined.

With him was a tall glamazon of a woman, her face half-concealed by huge designer sunglasses. Her golden hair sparkled in the sun, and her clothing screamed ‘I paid a small fortune for this’. She had one hand possessively curled round his arm. She could only be one person.

Unless I was willing to risk jumping into traffic as both Max and my ex along with his pregnant girlfriend, closed in on me from either side, there was just nowhere to run. My brain screamed in desperation.

“Mimi.” Josh reached me, still smiling. To my shock and surprise, Lillian was smiling as well. Broadly too, I might add.

“Hi,” I croaked. Why was she smiling? She thought I was a slut. The text of her email was burned into my poor brain forever. I’d never forget the feeling of her hatred coming through the screen at me. Yet there she was, beaming at me.

What if she was just trying to catch me off-guard? What if she took a swing at me? I couldn’t hit a pregnant woman. Maybe I could offer her my coffee cake as a gesture of peace. No. Not the cake.

Josh put a hand on my arm. I told myself the burning sensation was just my imagination. The violent need to slap it off was not, though. I shook his hand off and took a step back.

“How are you? I’ve hardly seen you around the office these last few days,” he boomed.

Are you insane? Are you literally crazy? Either that or it was me. I had dreamed the entire, crazy situation. How else could I explain away the warm, friendly, oblivious vibes I was picking up from the two of them?

“Listen,” he continued, smiling adoringly at Lillian before turning back to me again. “You’re one of the first to know. We got engaged and we’re having our engagement party at the St. Regis in three weeks. You’d better be there.” He laughed. “Or be square.”

I blinked. What had I ever done to deserve this?

For her part, Lillian grinned like a cat that got the whole tub of cream and held up her left hand. Sure enough, there was a medium-sized diamond on her wiggling ring finger.

It was a nightmare. That was it. I was having a nightmare and in a few seconds, I’d look down and find out I wasn’t wearing clothes. And everybody would point and laugh at me.

That had to be it. Nothing else made sense.

I was facing my ex and the woman he’d cheated on with me, and they were both smiling and inviting me to their goddamned engagement party. Why wouldn’t I wake up already?

I opened my mouth to speak, but another voice cut me off.