“Definitely not that one,” my best friend Nika cried as I pulled a lime green mini dress out and showed it to her over Skype, “that color says, ‘I’m on molly at Coachella’, not ‘I’m on a fancy dinner date like a grownup’.”

I shoved it back into the oblivion of the wardrobe. This was way harder than it ought to be. Nathan said he wanted to take me out on what he termed a ‘proper date’ tonight. The only problem with that was that the diner on Monday had seemed like a proper date to me. Was it not a proper date? What exactly constituted a proper date?

“You need something that conveys clearly that you are gonna fuck him later, but not right there on the table of the restaurant,” Nika advised me as I continued to root around in my meager selection of apparel, “also something classy but not too businesslike. You don’t want to look like you’re at work.”

I was almost out of options. There was only one dress left in my closet, so I hoped Nika thought it was alright. The lime green one had seemed fine to me, which was why Nika picked out most of my clothes for me.

“Ok, how about this?” I asked, pulling the plum-colored chiffon tank dress from its hanger and draping it over my front, “what do you think?”

Nika had just shoved a bite of ice cream into her face, but she gave me two thumbs up in the little picture on the screen.

“Mmmmf!” She said appreciatively, swallowing the ice cream and then adding, “Yep, that’s definitely the one. Put it on.”

Even though Nika lived forever away—she was in Tallahasse, where we’d grown up together—we talked constantly. Thank god for Skype, because I’d never really made friends in Philly and most of my friends from college were now scattered all over the country trying to scrape out a living just like me.

Nika and I, however, had been friends long before college. We were neighbors growing up and went all through school from kindergarten to high school together. I may have technically been an only child, but Nika was basically my sister.

So, I felt perfectly at ease stripping down in front of the camera to put the dress on over my nicest lingerie.

“Perfect!” Nika said, twirling her index finger around for me to spin, “Yep, that makes your big butt look really good. Are you going to wear heels?”

“Yeah, I thought I would,” I told her, “he’s actually tall enough for me to wear them without, you know, making him all insecure.”

That was one of my pet peeves. I’d dated a few guys before that had been intimidated by my height. Personally, being taller than a guy never bothered me. I was taller than most people, obviously. But, there were some men who just couldn’t handle not being the taller one in the relationship for some reason. I was glad I didn’t have that problem with Nathan; although if his confidence was any indication, he probably wouldn’t mind me wearing high heels even if he was shorter.

“Ok,” Nika followed up, “show me which shoes you were thinking.”

I pulled out a few pairs and we went through the pros and cons of each. We ended up selecting a pair of strappy bronze sandals with four-inch block heels. I slipped them on, feeling sleek and sexy in my demure dress and long silver earrings I’d selected. I’d put my hair up in a French twist at Nika’s instruction, securing it with a bunch of bobby pins until it looked effortless.

“Am I ready?” I asked her, looking into the camera with apprehension.

“Of course, you are,” she replied soothingly, “I think you look super-hot.”

Nika was a neonatal nurse in a hospital in Tallahasse. She took care of tiny, sick babies all day, so I think seeing me getting stressed out over such silly things as dates or bills always just baffled her. I could never do her job.

“I saw on the news that your Mr. Nathan Breyer is going to be the test pilot on Friday,” Nika ventured, “what do you think of him literally blasting himself into space in two days?”

I shrugged.

“He’s done it before,” I replied, “and I think he knows what he’s doing.”

“You don’t think it’s kind of weird? I mean, isn’t he more of business man now? There was somebody on MSNBC that said he was an ‘egomaniac of epic proportions’ to do it himself. Other people said he was brave. I just think it’s kind of strange to think that you’re going to dinner with somebody who’s going to be in space in 72 hours.”

“Actually,” I replied tartly, “he should be back on the ground in 72 hours. He’s only supposed to be up there for like 20 minutes.”

“Hmm,” Nika said noncommittally, “I see you haven’t been thinking about it all. So, what’s he like?”

I felt myself blush and hoped the poor-quality video hid it.

“He’s nice,” I said in a small voice, “and I really like him.”

“Oh no,” Nika said, rolling her eyes, “you’re already in love with him, aren’t you?”

“No!” I answered defensively, “I’m not in love with him. I just like him. Is that so wrong?”

“Of course not,” Nika said, frowning at me as she took her next bite of ice cream as she considered her next words, “I just think you should be careful. Don’t fall in love with somebody too quickly.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I replied dryly.

Nika had married her college sweetheart and lived in blissful matrimonial security down in Florida. She didn’t understand. I lived from paycheck to paycheck, so the immediacy of an affair like this didn’t necessarily seem too unbelievable to me. When you’re just scraping around to get by, you take happiness where you can find it. I didn’t have time to be careful because I never knew what the future would throw at me. Did I know my heart was going to get smashed to smithereens? Yes, of course. Did I care? Not remotely.