Chapter 9

By the time Paul dropped me off at home, it was full dark, and even though it was too early for bed, I climbed into my pajamas and dragged my comforter onto our sixth floor balcony. I wrapped myself up against the night air and stared out at the city lights, which for me constituted the sulfur lights on the apartment buildings across the street.

I hadn’t left this morning meaning to break up with my boyfriend. I hadn’t meant to spend the rest of the day with him after dumping him and have it be…fine. And it had been. He was quieter than usual, but his meticulous calculations had indeed found us good fish and chips and the perfect spot to watch the sunset. But he didn’t pout or anything. Didn’t even make one passive-aggressive remark, and if I’d had to carry a little bit more of the weight of keeping the conversation going, well…that seemed fair.

But I was super wiped. All that fresh air and boyfriend dumping. And really, I should be sitting here trying to figure it all out. Like why the impulse had come over me. But I didn’t want to. And when Ranée came home an hour later, I yawned and told her I was going to sleep without mentioning the Paul thing. I wasn’t in the mood for questions.

That didn’t keep her from jerking me out of sleep at way-too-early-o’clock the next morning when she landed on my bed with a weird cannonball/ninja roll.

“Wake up,” she said with her face an inch from mine. But considering the cannonball, it didn’t need to be said.

I blinked at her. “Please move out.”

She crawled under the covers instead and stared at me from the other pillow.

“That pillow is for decoration, not roommate invasions.”

“Why does Paul’s Facebook say ‘single’ now?”

I rubbed my eyes and tried to process what she was saying. “Why are you even paying attention to Paul’s Facebook?” Then I sat up and gasped. “Ranée! Do you secretly love him?”

She bounced the pillow I’d just abandoned off my head. “Shut up. No. But that Tyler guy just posted something on your wall asking what happened so then I looked at Paul’s, and I’m incredibly smart so I kind of already know, but tell me what happened anyway.”

“Wait, what?” Tyler was an old co-worker who’d switched over to Paul’s company. I’d met Paul at a party at Tyler’s house. Tyler was the biggest gossip in the office, so it figured he’d be the first to sniff something out. “Break this down for me. I’m only halfway there.”

“Well, working backward, I think Paul changed his relationship status to single, Tyler saw it and posted something on each of your walls asking what happened, and that’s when I saw it. So what happened? If Tyler gets the story before I do, you’re dead to me.”

I rubbed more sleep from my eyes and glared at her. “I’m fine with that.”

“Talk.”

“This is going to be really anticlimactic for you. He planned an awesome day, and I should have loved it, but instead I broke up with him. He was nice about it, and we hung out the rest of the day anyway, but I don’t think we’re going to hang out ever again.” I collapsed back on my pillow. “I’m an idiot. What was I thinking?”

“He wasn’t good for you. He’s all the things you already are. You need someone who is all the things you’re not. So let’s figure out who that is.”

I turned over to look at her. “Did you just tell me that I need to think of the ways I’m lacking?”

“Yes! I mean, no,” she amended when she saw my frown. “I meant that you need to think of the qualities someone should have to balance you. Balance. That’s good.”

“You must be in marketing.”

“How’d you know? So let’s think of some stuff. Like you’re a total planner, so you need someone who’s more spontaneous.”

“I just got out of a relationship twelve hours ago. Maybe I need some ‘me’ time.”

But she barreled on. “You’re too serious sometimes, so you need someone with an excellent sense of humor. Like maybe someone who is Twitter-famous for his Photoshopping skills.”

I rolled out of bed onto the floor. “Bye,” I said, army crawling for the door.

She jumped in front of it and shut it. “Jack’s great. You should date him.”

I sat up, and then, because it hurt my neck to glare up at her, I stood up instead. “First of all, he lives in Portland. Or near it somewhere in a hipster cave where he sleeps in a nest of flannel. So no. But also, there’s this whole thing about I don’t want to date him. Which is kind of my main reason. Now move.”

I tugged the door open and slid past her to spend quality time with my Cinnamon Toast Crunch, or as my dad called it, “Dessert for breakfast.”

“Let’s talk about this,” she said across the breakfast bar.

I poured a bowl of cereal without turning around to look at her. “There is no ‘us’ talking about this. You’re going to talk at me. I can feel it.”

“Yes. Yes, I am. Did you love Paul?”

“No.”

“Then you’re not heartbroken and we can talk about this.”

“Of course I’m not heartbroken. I’m also not made of time, and I don’t have time for dating right now. It shouldn’t have been so hard for Paul and me to find time for each other. I need to get this new job under control and then I’ll think about it.”

I turned around to move to the table and squeaked to find her right in front of me, her phone up like a stop sign in her outstretched hand. “Before you say that, check this out.”

I blinked and focused on the picture. I recognized her brother, Sean, and another guy in a beanie. They were hanging from climbing ropes, obviously near the top of a cliff that whoever was taking the shot was standing on. The other guy had an electric smile, one you couldn’t help but return, even in a photo, and the corner of my mouth twitched up. “You want to hook me up with another one of your brother’s friends?”

“You think he’s hot?”

“He’s more my speed than Man Bun Jack.”

“That is Jack.” She looked as satisfied as if she’d eaten all my Cinnamon Toast Crunch herself. Then she took the bowl out of my hands and began to do exactly that.

Somehow I now had her phone in my hands instead. I sighed and looked down at the picture, enlarging it for a better view. Either this was before Jack had grown his hair out or maybe it was pulled back, but now I could see the strong jaw and high cheekbones I recognized from his other pictures. It’s just that in those, he had these faux-expressions, like over the top Handsome Man Smiles or Hot Guy Smolders. Here, he was just a really cute guy hanging out with his friend, no irony at all.

I set the phone down and poured another bowl of cereal. “Nope.”

“I’m going to change your mind.”

“You’re really not.”

“I am. Because there’s no way you can say no to what I’m about to suggest.”

“No.”

“Stop being boring and listen to me. Here’s the plan. You’re going to start leaving funny comments on all of Jack’s pictures, and he’s going to find you irresistible. So then you guys will start DM-ing, leading to a delicious flirting affair. And then he’s going to be so impressed with your sense of humor because you’ll be the only woman who could ever keep up with him that he’s going to fall madly in love with you, and you’ll finally lure him out of his flannel cave nest, and Sean will get off my back.”

“No.” I blinked at her. “Wait. What do you mean Sean will get off your back?”

“I didn’t say that. Let’s stick with the plan. Write something funny on his Facebook. Or better yet, his Twitter.”

“No way. You’re not getting off the hook. What do you mean Sean will get off your back? About what?”

“Nothing.” She waved at the phone in my hand. “Write the funny things.”

I shrugged. “Sure,” I said, tapping the screen. “I’ll write all the funny things, but this is your phone, so it’s you who’s going to be flirting with him.”

“What? Stop.” She sloshed the milk from her bowl as she plunked it on the table and raced to snatch back her phone. “Now go do it on your own account.”

“That’s the least compelling suggestion anyone has ever made to me.” I settled back into my chair to enjoy my cereal.

“You have to.”

“I will. Right after you tell me what Sean has to do with this.” I knew Sean well enough from previous appearances on our couch when he visited Ranée, so now my curiosity was way up about why he was involved. But Ranée only sent me a sulky look and hunkered back down over her cereal bowl. There was no way I was dropping that Sean comment, but I let it go for the moment. I’d find a different way to drag it out of her.

She left a while later, yelling something about tai-chi in the park on her way out. I had a whole Sunday stretching in front of me now, and no commitments to keep. Suddenly I didn’t know what to do with all that time.

I opened Facebook to look at Paul’s profile for myself, but he wasn’t in my friends list anymore. When I typed in his name in the search bar, it offered me the option to add him as a friend. Which meant that I’d been unfriended.

It stung a little, like when someone said they couldn’t go to lunch with you because they had a meeting. And even though you saw them walk right into the meeting, you still felt sort of dumb for having asked and been told no.

It was stupid to feel that way, considering Paul probably felt way worse, but I had thought we’d stay friends, or at least politely ignore each other on social media while still kind of keeping tabs on each other. Because of curiosity. Was that weird?

I wished Ranée were home so I could ask her, but then remembered her regular ex-boyfriend stalking and realized she’d tell me not only was it not weird, it was pretty much my right and duty as an American to keep track and make sure his next girlfriend wasn’t as cute as me.

For sure I wanted Paul to move on. He could even move on to someone prettier and it wouldn’t bother me. I just wanted her to be less successful or have weird habits.

Annoyed, I clicked to my own profile and changed it to “single” and uploaded a picture I’d taken from the boat yesterday, a shot of my bare feet, the bow stretched past them, the water glinting off the bay in the background. I captioned it “Lazy Saturday.” I knew Paul wouldn’t see it now, but it finally made me feel better to post about the day without any mention of him. Why not? He wasn’t part of my landscape anymore. It seemed like a fair trade for Paul’s unfriending, a passive-aggressive way to feel like I hadn’t given him the last word.

But I didn’t feel better. He’d straight dropped me from Facebook after we’d spent a good afternoon as friends. Rude.

I tagged Ranée in it and added a comment. “You should come with me next time.”

I used the rest of the morning to re-organize the pantry, throwing out stuff that was past its expiration date and making grand plans to cook more and eat out less. I’d never stick to it, but the planning made me feel better anyway, pushed back the slight ickiness that came from breakup aftermath. Sometimes I felt relief when a relationship ended, that feeling of breathing a little better. This breakup with Paul was like that. Still, there was a bit of sadness when something you started with a spark ended with a fizzle.

My phone sent me an alert around lunch. “Jack Dobson has tagged you in a picture.”