Chapter 11

• Megan looked at Emily, who shrugged, but the sudden buckling of her wide mouth was answer enough. She patted her hand.
• “Did you ever get to a point in a relationship… when all of the things that your lover used to find charming and lovable are now just really fucking annoying and infuriating? Because I’m pretty sure that’s what’s happening to him and me,” Emily said, voicing her frustration.
• Meredith, who was sitting next to Emily, scooted closer to her. “How could anyone find you annoying?” she asked, offering her comfort.
• “Oh please. No. I find him annoying and infuriating. Every time that motherfucker starts rampaging about the best IPA, I want to smack him,” Emily continued, her irritation evident.
• “So, then, break up,” Megan suggested, trying to offer a solution. “I know you just moved in together, but… you could stay here if you need to.”
• Emily and Meredith both peered at Megan with owl eyes, surprised by her suggestion. It was a little insulting to Megan that they seemed shocked by her offer.
• “How do you two know each other?” Meredith asked. “Through that cunt David?”
• “Whoa, David isn’t all bad,” Emily said, taking a bite of her bagel. “Well, he isn’t my best pal or anything, but not everything was his fault.”
• “He cheated on my sister so much that I’m obligated to hate him,” Meredith countered, her voice filled with anger.
• “Fair point.”
• “Fair or not, there’s no need to talk about him that way.” Megan looked down at her crumb-laden plate, avoiding Meredith’s fierce glare. “I’m just saying… I was part of the problem. I was never comfortable with him I never trusted him. And it alienated him. I wasn't excusing his behavior, but I also couldn't excuse mine."
• Emily nodded emphatically. "Yeah, your big sis used to gaslight David all the time, and it wasn't cool. But David also wasn't cool. They just needed to break up and get with big-boobs fuckers like Susan."
• "Will there ever come a time when you stop talking about their sex?" Megan asked dryly.
• "No. That time won't come."
• Meredith cackled. She and Emily grinned at each other like conspirators. With the two of them together, Megan was positive every conversation would leave her cringing with mortification.
• "Emily is friends with some of David's coworkers," Megan said, rerouting to the original question and straying from the topic of dicks. "One of whom is the older brother of David's new girlfriend."
• "Mmm. The Rodriguez family are so fine…." Emily said, looking all glassy-eyed and daydreamy, so Megan kept talking.
• "I'm pretty sure he and David became friends after meeting multiple times at parties and gatherings arranged by mutual friends, which is also how Emily and I grew close."
• It was a simple version of the events. The truth was, Oliver observation about Megan's presence at gatherings arranged by David's friends had been accurate. In the tumultuous year and a half before David and Megan broke up for good, she had forced herself to accompany him to various events.
• She had always wound up feeling awkward and miserable, trapped around people who did not know how to act around her and who had avoided her rather than try. Emily had been the exception. She had picked up on her unhappiness and had, at every party or happy hour, made it her mission to tease her or engage her in conversation. She had never failed to make her smile. And after the breakup, she had kept in touch. Somehow she had known she had felt alienated.
• But Megan left all of that out, even as a surge of fondness swelled in her. She grabbed Emily's hand in an uncharacteristic show of affection, and she dimpled at her adorably.
• "I appreciate anyone who supports my sister," Meredith said. "Us Stone kids tend to not have close friends. Between our daddy's shitty sociopathic genes and our mother's cynicism-flavored breast milk, people are quick to realize we're a mess and back away."
• "Are there any native New Yorkers who aren't cynical?" Emily said. "I'm coming up with a short list."
• "I can't think of anyone," Megan admitted. "Even...even the New Yorkers on dating websites and apps are pretty grim. It's depressing."
• "Have you tried Christian Mingle?" Meredith smirked. "You may find some inspirational on there."
• The suggestion was so abominable that Megan disregarded it totally.
• “Match and OkCupid make me feel like I’m writing a résumé, trying to sell myself to a potential boyfriend via checklists and categories. Tumblr is… full of superficial or aggressive people. I only created a profile because David he had tried it before. But it’s… not for me. Everyone seems to be on it for a quick bang behind a shed somewhere.”
• “Is that a bad thing?” Meredith snorted.
• “Yes,” Megan said. “Overall, the online dating communities seem to either be extremely divisive or focused exclusively on impersonal sex.”
• Meredith shrugged. “Sounds right up my alley.”
• Megan frowned.
• Meredith blanched. “How? Don’t we have the same DNA? Sex is everything.”
• Megan gestured vaguely, swallowed her embarrassment, and went for the easiest explanation. “I don’t feel comfortable with my lack of experience, so I don’t feel comfortable with… doing the sexual things I want to do. So I do nothing at all.”
• “Unless Oliver is there?” Emily grinned. “He brings out your inner ho.”
• “That is what I want the dirt on,” Meredith said. “Give it to me.”
• Neither of them were surprised by Megan's refusal to give said dirt, but Emily had a fine time extrapolating. She didn’t know anything beyond her confession about the details of New Year’s Eve, but she’d assumed a lot about what had happened after speed dating. Some of her theories were less erotic than what had actually happened, which led to some subtle smirking on Megan's part.
• Having a secret was more enjoyable than she’d thought it would be, even if half of the fun was her friends finding her interesting for the first time in quite a while. For the past three years, the primary topic of her conversations had revolved around David.
• When prying the truth out of her didn’t work, Emily and Meredith began attempting to talk her out of job hunting. Meredith said it was pointless when Megan was loaded enough to never have to work a day in her life, and Emily thought she should take time off to travel—that was what she would do if she had money.
• Megan shook her head at them both but made a mental note to potentially take Emily on a trip for her birthday. Although she had unconventional hours, she had a lot of them. Between bartending at night, waiting tables at middle shifts during the day, and her modeling jobs and dance classes, the girl didn’t have time for much except stolen mornings like these. But she never complained.
• “I don’t know what I want to do,” Megan said after Meredith joined forces with Emily to push the traveling idea. “But a blog about midthirties single traveling the world isn’t going to be one of them.”
• “It’s a good idea,” Emily insisted. “Like a faggy Bridget Jones.”
• “Um. No.”
• “Or Eat. Love.” Meredith dissolved into chuckles, admiring the brilliance of her own joke.
• Emily joined her, and at that point it was a lost cause.
• Megan stood, collecting their dishes and packing away the leftover food.
• “I'm not spending the rest of her thirties randomly traveling the world. The finding yourself crap is for romantic people with questionable ideals,” Megan said.
• “Hey!” Meredith watched Megan brush crumbs onto plates and made no move to help. “I thought it worked for me.”
• “Oh come off it, Mere. You were the UN Ambassador for admiring foreign cock.”
• “You’re damn right. Jealous?” She smiled, nudging Megan with her foot. “You could do the same.”
• “I could,” Megan said. “But that won’t help me figure out my life here, and the same problems would be waiting for me when I got back. Running away doesn’t help a damn thing. I learned that lesson from our mother.”
• The comment sobered Meredith, and Emily appeared to sense that the trajectory of the conversation had turned more serious than it had been. When she’d gone to her waitering job and Mere had dashed out to a writing class she’d begun taking, Megan was once again alone. It didn’t take long for the restlessness to return.
• She paced the apartment, tidying things that didn’t need tidying and trying to figure out what to do with herself. This happened every day, and she always wound up sitting at the kitchen bar with a glass of wine while she alternated between searching job listings and dating websites. Both left her steeped in frustration.
• There were equal numbers of technically suitable job postings and single gay men listed on the Internet, but technically okay wasn’t what she wanted anymore. She didn’t want to be a CFO of any random company just because she was good with numbers, and she didn’t want to privately message every gay man who happened to be single and attractive just because his profile was normal instead of horrifying.
• But that was what it came down to. None of the jobs excited her, and because of the inadequate design and run-of-the-mill algorithms of dating websites, none of those triggered her happy buttons either.
• She frequently heard stories about people with quarter-life crises who got up one day and decided to reinvent themselves, but she was not one of those people, and as a result, she felt lost.
• By sunset, depression kicked in.
• Which was when Oliver texted her.
• Thursday night at nine o’clock. Be my plus one?
• Her fingers hovered above the screen for only a moment.
• Yes.