Seeing Mr. Amazing downtown—I didn’t know his name, so I had to call him something—had clearly messed with my head. In the week after my impromptu coffee date with Blake, it felt like I saw him everywhere.

I caught a glimpse of someone who might have been him at the grocery store. I thought I saw him again when I was taking Edgar for a walk. A man I could have sworn was him had been at the Thai place near my house when I stopped in to grab takeout. And I saw him—or someone I thought might be him—at least twice a day on campus.

Of course, I couldn’t confirm any of those sightings. When I’d seen him downtown, he’d been standing in the open, right there on the sidewalk. Since then, I’d only seen him from behind, or from the corner of my eye. Glimpses of a man walking around a corner or ducking through a door. I couldn’t be sure any of them had been him.

The problem was, it was all so unlikely. What were the chances that another person had suddenly adopted a routine and schedule that was almost identical to mine? It was possible he was new on staff at Woodward. I didn’t know everyone who worked there, and people came and went all the time. Or maybe he was a student. Although I guessed he was roughly the same age as me, we had students of all ages.

That would explain seeing him around campus—even at Café Lit. But it didn’t explain seeing him downtown, or any of the other places where I’d caught a glimpse of him.

I figured there were three potential explanations. One, I was imagining things, and other than running into him downtown, none of the other sightings had been him. Two, I was seeing him everywhere I went, but it was all an enormous coincidence. Or three, Mr. Amazing was stalking me.

Coincidence didn’t seem likely. But the idea that he was stalking me was even less so. I needed to remember Occam’s Razor: the simplest explanation was usually the correct one.

The problem with the stalking theory was the number of assumptions it required. The more assumptions one had to make for the explanation to be plausible, the less likely it was to be true.

To conclude that Mr. Amazing was my stalker, I had to assume he had a motive—a reason to stalk me. I had no idea what that could be. I wasn’t famous, even on a small scale. I didn’t use Instagram or other social media heavily enough that my face would be recognizable. My colleagues knew me, but outside the world of Woodward College, I wasn’t a particularly important person.

There was the small possibility that it had to do with my inheritance. I could already hear Jessica musing over whether someone had discovered I had money. But how would a perfect stranger know? I could count on one hand the number of people who were aware of my recently upgraded financial status. Arthur, and some of the staff at Dorset Financial. And my friends Jessica and Peter. I hadn’t told anyone else.

That made the explanation that Mr. Amazing had discovered I was wealthy, and determined that stalking me was the best course of action for—well, for what? Stealing my money? Worming his way into my life so he could marry me without a prenup, divorce me, and run off with my father’s fortune? The number of assumptions grew, and the likelihood that I was being stalked diminished.

The simplest explanation was that I was imagining things. Simplest, and probably correct.

I told myself, rather sternly, that what I was experiencing was selective attention. It’s like when you decide to buy a new car, and you settle on a red one. Suddenly, you see red cars everywhere, as if half the people in your city suddenly bought new red cars.

There aren’t actually more red cars than there were before. Your brain is simply paying attention to them because your subconscious deems them important. I had seen Mr. Amazing at Café Lit, and again downtown, and he’d obviously made an impression on me. So now I was seeing men who resembled him, and jumping to the conclusion that they were all the same person. All Mr. Amazing. All watching me.

Parting the curtain on my front room window, I looked outside. The sky was just beginning to lighten, and the street lights still glowed. Once I’d thought I saw him on my street, but when I’d looked again, no one had been there. Still, I’d taken to keeping my curtains closed, just in case.

Edgar nuzzled my hand, flicking his tongue across the backs of my fingers. I smiled down at him and scratched behind his ears.

“Hey, buddy. Almost ready for your walk?”

The presence of my dog made it even less likely that I was being stalked. Edgar’s white fur and black nose made him look like a cuddly polar bear. But he was not friendly. To me, he was the perfect pet—sweet and loyal, typically well-behaved. And he’d loved my dad. He tolerated Jessica, and treated Peter with a sort of canine indifference, as if he’d sniffed him out and found him uninteresting.

But he hated every other human on the planet.

He wasn’t dangerous. But he eyed people with a great deal of suspicion, and he rarely let other people pet him. He’d move away when they tried and growl if they didn’t take the hint. Plus, he barked when people came near the house. If someone was creeping around, watching me, Edgar would let me know.

I took him for his morning walk, let him do his business, and then headed to work. I parked in the lot near my building and walked across the street to Café Lit. Jessica had already texted to say she’d meet me there.

She and Peter were inside, standing near the back, both with to-go cups in their hands. Jessica was dressed in a purple paisley blouse, her mass of black curls pulled back. Peter pushed his dark-rimmed glasses up his nose. I noticed the corner of his shirt was partially untucked.

Jess smiled at me and there was something about her expression that made me pause. I took my place in line, but her eyes were wide, and she kept flicking them to one side. It was like she was trying to send me a signal—perhaps without Peter knowing—but I wasn’t sure what she was getting at. Looking around, I didn’t see anything unusual.

As I turned to meet them after ordering my coffee, I realized what she’d been trying to say. Mr. Amazing was here. My view of him had been obscured by someone sitting at another table, but there he was.

He sat at a table with two to-go cups in front of him. He had his hand wrapped around one, while the other sat across from him. I assumed it meant he was here with someone, and for reasons I couldn’t explain, that bothered me. I glanced around the shop, but no one seemed to be heading toward his table. Whoever she was—did I have to assume it was a woman?—she could have been in the bathroom. Or perhaps she hadn’t arrived yet, and he’d ordered for her.

I tried very hard to ignore the fact that he was watching me. Again.

Jessica grabbed my arm and yanked me closer as soon as I was within reach. “Girl, he is staring at you. Don’t worry. Peter and I have this.”

“We have what?” Peter asked.

“This,” Jessica hissed. “Don’t stress, honey. Peter, move over a little bit so you block his view.”

Peter looked around as if just realizing there were other people present. “Whose view?”

“Shh,” Jessica said. “I don’t care how hot that man is, he’s creepy. We’ll get out of here as soon as your order comes up.”

Peter shook his head and looked at something on his phone.

“I’m sure it’s fine,” I said. “It looks like he’s waiting for someone, that’s all.”

“He looked like a dog on alert as soon as you opened the door,” she said. “Sat up straight, eyes on you. If he had a tail, he’d have wagged it.”

I laughed. “A dog analogy?”

Jessica shrugged. “It fits.”

I shifted so I could take a quick peek at Mr. Amazing. I really needed to come up with another nickname for him. Or maybe see if I could sneak a look at his cup—the barista must have written his name on it. His eyes were still on me, as if we were the only two people here.

For a second, it felt like we were. A strange sensation overtook me—a tingling across my skin—and I was momentarily convinced that the cup of coffee sitting across from him was meant for me.

Just as I felt myself begin to move toward his table—as if he were the moon and I was the tide being pulled by his gravity—the barista called my name.

I blinked and went to the counter to get my order. Jess and Peter moved toward the door, and I followed without looking back.

Jessica linked arms with me. Peter walked beside her, but as usual, he didn’t seem to be paying attention to the world around him.

“I have to get to my office, so give me the quick version,” she said.

“Quick version?” I asked. How did she know? I hadn’t told her about seeing Mr. Amazing downtown, nor that I’d spent the last week thinking I saw him everywhere.

“Of your date,” she said.

“Oh, my date.” I blinked a few times, trying to get my head back on straight. What was wrong with me? I’d gone out with Blake again, this time for dinner. “Right. It was nice.”

“Nice?” she asked. We crossed the street and she stopped. Peter kept walking until he realized we weren’t beside him anymore, and paused. “That’s it?”

A tendril of hair tickled the back of my neck, so I adjusted a bobby pin. “What do you want to know? We went to dinner and talked.”

“And?”

“And, nothing,” I said. “I met him there, so I drove myself home.”

“You’re so boring,” she said, rolling her eyes.

“I’m sorry my fledgling love life isn’t entertaining enough for you,” I said. “I’ll try to make the next date more exciting.”

“So there will be a next date?”

I shrugged. “I guess so.”

“You’re not very enthusiastic,” she said.

“I’m just not sure,” I said. “On paper, he seems great. He’s good-looking, well-dressed, successful. I did learn he’s never been married, and he calls his mother every week.”

“All good things,” she said. “But?”

“But I don’t know if I’m attracted to him,” I said. “I didn’t feel much of anything. I think you were right about needing a dating ice-breaker, but I’m not sure if this is going anywhere.”

“Well, that’s fair,” she said with a little shrug. “If there’s no attraction, you can’t really force it. Do you think you’ve given it enough of a chance?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe not? I’ll probably go out with him again.”

She gave me a subtle smile. “How many times did you quote Jane Austen?”

“What? None.”

“Who did you quote, then?” she asked.

“I don’t know… Fine, I think Melville and maybe Tolstoy. I can’t help it.”

“If you found someone who is not a lit teacher who will ask you out again after dealing with an evening of your literary references, you need to at least give him a few dates,” she said.

“Fair enough.”

“If he does word puzzles, you might have to marry him,” she said.

I rolled my eyes and started walking toward my building. “I’ll see you later, Jess. Bye, Peter.”

Peter glanced up and nodded. Jessica caught up with him and he slipped his arm around her waist, then leaned down to kiss her forehead. They were so cute.

My back prickled, and I glanced over my shoulder. Mr. Amazing was watching me. He stood outside the coffee shop across the street, leaning against the building like he had been when I’d seen him downtown. As if he didn’t have a care in the world, and staring at a perfect stranger was a completely normal thing to do. He had both cups of coffee in his hands, and I wondered again if he’d ordered that second one for me.

Which was proof of how crazy I was being. Of course he hadn’t bought me coffee. That was just silly.