What about the way the motorcycle drove his mother crazy?

  Oh my god.

  I cross my arms over my chest. “Did your mother make you do it?”

  “Don’t start with my mother again.” Ryan groans.

  “I’m just shocked. I wish you would have talked to me before you sold it.”

  “Hey,” he says, more warmly. “If it’s that important to you to have one last hurrah on a motorcycle before we get married, let’s rent one and do the Appalachians.”

  It’s his I-surrender voice, the hoisting of the little white flag. And this is when I’m supposed to laugh and say thanks, baby, and then we’d let the conversation drift to something pleasant. We could start talking about the trip, about making it real. About the route we’d want to take and where we’d stop along the way. This is when I’d pretend Ryan didn’t just say some truly alarming things about his expectations of our life.

  We’ve become masters at changing the subject, lightening the mood. Pretending certain realities don’t loom in our near future.

  But tonight, I don’t do the thing we always do. I don’t lean in for a kiss or shrug it off. I look him in the eye and say:

  “I’m tired of this idea that everything has to change—that we have to change—after we get married. It’s a wedding, not an apocalypse. Isn’t the point to celebrate what we already have?”

  “Okay . . . how much have you had to drink?” he says, bumping my shoulder with his. I know he means to be playful, but it feels patronizing.

  I rise from the barstool, grab my purse. “I need some air,” I say.

  Ryan glances around, always aware of appearances. Even when he doesn’t know a single person in this restaurant or this neighborhood. As if everyone is already deciding whether to vote for him. It’s maddening.

  “Sure,” he says when he realizes I’m serious. He throws down a credit card and motions the bartender. “Let’s get you some air.”

  I march outside alone before the bartender runs his card. I have half a mind to hail a cab and head back to my apartment by myself. The thing that stops me scares me.

  If I left now, made Ryan meet me back home, I might cool off a little by the time he caught up with me. And we might make up without having the fight we really need to have.

  We’re overdue.

  So I wait on the curb, and I think. About why I love him—so many reasons. Ninety-nine of them. But since learning the truth about Noa Callaway, there’s been a voice in my head asking if they’re the right reasons. I think about the life each of us wants—so different from the other.

  Before I’ve figured out how to square all this, Ryan comes outside. He’s as handsome as ever in his navy bomber jacket and jeans. His eyes twinkle, as if to say, You’re not still mad, are you?

  “Feeling better?” he says, and opens his arms to me.

  I step into his embrace, feel his arms close comfortingly around me. For a long time, we say nothing. Tears sting my eyes as I pull back to look at him.

  “Why do you love me, Ryan?”

  He drops his arms, rubs his face. “Lanie, what are you doing?”

  “I’m being honest. It’s an honest question.”

  He shakes his head and turns away, facing the street and the traffic, the cabs stopping and spilling out happily chattering young people, looking for the heart of Saturday night.

  “I don’t understand what happened to us,” Ryan says, not looking at me. “We used to be so happy. The night we got engaged I was ecstatic. Kissing you on that jumbotron, my ring on your finger, I felt so proud that everyone could see we were the perfect couple. Now . . . recently, you act like you’re being held at gunpoint just to pick a date for our wedding—”

  “I don’t think I want to be a perfect couple,” I say.

  He laughs like this is crazy. “What?”

  I take his hands. “I just want to be me. I want you to be you. Complete with all our eccentricities. I want us to write poetry to each other, even if it’s bad.”

  “I don’t think I follow. . . .”

  I close my eyes. “I wasn’t happy that night we got engaged.”

  “What?” This is a record-scratch moment. Ryan’s tone draws eyes from strangers on the street.

  “I’ve been happy in our relationship. I’ve been mostly very happy. But I wasn’t happy the night you proposed.”

  He squints at me. “You wept! You have that picture on your wall!”

  “I didn’t weep out of joy,” I say.

  Ryan thinks. “Okay, yes, I remember you started freaking out about your mom—”

  “That was part of it.”

  “And the other part?” he asks.

  “I’m a Dodgers fan.”

  “Come again?” Ryan asks.

  “I’m a Dodgers fan. You know that.”

  “I know you have an old Dodgers T-shirt. I know you love Vin Scully. But what was I supposed to do, fly you out to a Dodgers game and propose there? It makes no sense to be a fan of a team in a city you’ve never lived in! You don’t even like Los Angeles!”

  “I’m a Dodgers fan because of Sandy Koufax,” I say. “I’ve told you that. My mom was four years old the year he sat out game one of the World Series on Yom Kippur. BD told you the story of taking the train across the country with my grandfather to watch Koufax pitch his no-hitter against the Yankees. He’s a hero in my family, like he’s a hero for most Jewish families in America. You’re supposed to remember things like this about the person you want to marry. But that’s not even the point.”

  “What is the point?” Ryan asks.

  “The fact that I’m a Dodgers fan has almost nothing to do with our relationship. But the Washington Nationals have even less to do with our relationship. They’re your team, and that’s great. I had fun at the game with you. But there’s nothing special about them or that stadium to us. You could have proposed to me at the bodega where we buy coffee, and it would have meant more. I wasn’t happy, Ryan. I was in shock when you proposed. Or should I say, when the jumbotron proposed. It asked me to marry you. You never even said the words.” I sigh. “I could have been anyone in the crowd.”

  “You’re not anyone,” he says, his voice cracking. “You’re Elaine Bloom and I love you. Uniquely.”

  “I know that you love me. And I love you. But I don’t think we love what our future looks like together. You want me to be all the things you want in a wife. But I’m not a Nationals fan just because I wore your hat that night. I won’t be a WASP, even if I convert. I’ll never stop being an editor, even if I change jobs. I don’t want five kids just because you do. And I hate wedding planning without my mother, not because I need her to pick out my dress, or even to see me wear it that day. I hate it because I know that if I go through with it, I might be getting her last words to me wrong.”

  “If you go through with it,” Ryan says, putting his hands on his head. He starts pacing. “Oh my god. You’re breaking up with me.”

  “Yeah,” I say softly. Though I didn’t know it until now. “Yeah.”

  I close my eyes. This hurts. I don’t want to break up with Ryan. I really don’t want to break up with Ryan. But I have to. I have to do it now, even as the rest of my life is already imploding. Because while Ryan is still all of the ninety-nine things I thought I wanted, it turns out that isn’t enough.

  And though he’d never admit to having a list of his own, I’m not the woman he wants to spend his life with, either. More important, I don’t want to become her.

  “You deserve—” I start to say.

  “Don’t tell me what I deserve,” he snaps. “I know what I deserve. I also know you’re going to regret this. Because you’re never going to find someone who will take care of you the way I can take care of you, who will give you the life I would have. And by the time you realize that, it’s going to be too late.”

  “I realize it already, Ryan. It’s already too late.”

  He stares at me as if we’ve never met before, which is what it feels like to break up with the person you thought you’d love forever.

  “Well,” he says. “I guess this is goodbye.”

  He turns and starts down the block. Steam from a subway grate rises up and obscures him from me even further.

  I did this, and I can’t believe it’s happening. I can’t believe how fast Ryan is walking away. For much of my life, I’ve wanted to be a Noa Callaway heroine; I’ve wanted to fall in love with a Noa Callaway hero. I thought I had found him in Ryan. And now, the only thing I know for sure is I was wrong.

  I think of my engagement ring, finally resized and ready for me to pick up at the jewelers. What do I do with it now?

  “Wait,” I call out, chasing after him. “What about—”

  He waves me off, still walking away. “You’ll figure it out, Lanie,” he calls over his shoulder. “Or you won’t. It’s not my problem anymore.” He turns and gives me a crushing look. “That’s the beauty of breaking up. One less problem.”

  Chapter Ten

  The diamond ring sits in its open clamshell box in the center of the outdoor table, looking radioactive.

  Late last night, when it became clear that my breakup with Ryan was not an oyster-induced hallucination, I’d texted Meg and Rufus:

  Maison Pickle. 11 a.m. Emergency Brunch.

  The term is a holdover from Meg’s and my days as assistants. It basically means there will be an excess of cocktails, complaints, and, in this case, crying. The host of Emergency Brunch need give no advance explanation, but these days, now that Meg has kids, and all of our lives have more responsibilities than they did seven years ago, it is only invoked in dire situations.

  I wait for them under a heat lamp on the patio at Maison Pickle on the Upper West Side, a box of tissues in my lap. It’s unseasonably warm, the sky blue and flecked with fluffy clouds, but all I see is gray.

  It feels like, if I had been even halfway paying attention, I might have seen this coming from a mile away. That’s the most embarrassing part. An essential piece of me knew something wasn’t right with Ryan for a while now, and I spent a long time trying to shut that piece up.

  I’m dreading having to say the word breakup aloud to Meg and Rufus, to make the nightmare real. When I see them come up from the train at Eighty-Sixth Street, this dread manifests like a brick over my chest.

  As it turns out, I don’t have to say anything. My friends take one look at my face—puffy; my hair—greasy; and my freshly resized engagement ring—very much not on my finger—and they know.

  “Fuuuuuuuuck, Lanie,” Rufus says, planting a kiss on my head as he sinks into the chair next to me.

  “We need a bottle of prosecco,” Meg calls to the nearest waiter. “And three shots of tequila.”

  “Damn, mama,” Rufus says to her. “Are we going clubbing after this? Because I’ll need to change.”

  “It’s called the Kate Moss,” Meg says. “You take the shot and sip the bubbles, and it helps, okay?”

  “I never argue with Kate Moss,” Rufus says, obliging. He takes off his sunglasses and sets them on the table next to his keys, his phone, his sunscreen, and his thirty-dollar lip balm. Meg and I bought him a man bag last Christmas in an attempt to limit the amount of real estate he always takes up on restaurant tables, but he’s set in his ways.

  “So, what happened?” Meg silences her phone. She does this only for very significant conversations. It makes me feel a grateful swell of love for her.

  “We were out last night,” I say, my stomach knotting at the memory. “We were having a good time. Like we always do. But then, I don’t know, suddenly it became clear that whenever we talk about getting married, it’s like the word has two different meanings. One for Ryan, one for me. And when I pushed on that a little, the whole thing just fell apart.” I snatch a tissue and blow my nose.

  Meg frowns at me, reaching across the table to squeeze my hand. “First of all, weddings are the devil. Planning one is enough to drive the happiest couple bananas. Tommy and I barely made it down the aisle after a feud over our table runners.”

  “The fuck is a table runner?” Rufus says.

  “Don’t ask,” Meg replies. “I’m still mad we went with maroon. The point is, it’s a lot.”

  “I guess,” I say, “but our disconnect was less about the wedding, and more about the marriage. We didn’t want the same life. We tried to ignore that for a long time. Stupidly long. Because . . . because . . .”

  “Because he was Ninety-Nine Things?” Meg offers.

  I drop my head on the table. Over the years, my friends have ribbed me about my list. But lovingly, acceptingly. If Meg and Rufus had any idea what an imposter Noa Callaway is, they’d pity me for real.

  “I’m such a fool,” I moan.

  “Lanie,” Rufus says, “plenty of people stay in worse relationships for way more pathetic reasons.”

  “True,” Meg says. “Do you remember Mary, my assistant two assistants ago? And those really long lunch breaks she used to take?”

  “She was always very sweaty in the afternoons,” Rufus says.

  “Well, I found out it was because her boyfriend refused to let her dog out, so she had to run home to Tribeca. Every. Single. Day. He worked from home! But she didn’t want to leave him because his apartment was rent-controlled.”

  “Well, my cousin,” Rufus says, leaning in and lowering his voice like he always does when he talks about his family, even though they all live on the West Coast, “is dating this dude who makes her call him ‘the Terminator’ during sex. And she stays because he put her on his gym membership!”

  “That’s kind of hot?” Meg says, as if trying to imagine it.

  “You have a problem,” Rufus says to her.

  “It has a name,” Meg says, closing her eyes. “Dry Spell.”

  “Meg, you and Tommy are allowed to have sex,” I say. “Even though you’re married.”

  She groans and leans back in her chair. “Married sex requires so much imagination, it’s exhausting.”

  “Like . . . you start doing it in imaginative places?” I ask. “Fire escape, that kind of thing?”

  “No, like I imagine Tommy is my friend’s ex-fiancé, and he’s calling me the Terminator.”

  Despite myself, I laugh, and Meg and Rufus cheer at the sound of it.

  “Our point is,” Rufus says, “you and Ryan are both boneable, successful, decent people. Stone-cold catches. It makes sense that you tried to make it work.”

  I run my finger over the ring in the box on the table. When the jeweler called this morning to schedule the pickup, I’d laughed so manically into the phone that I definitely freaked him out. I’d swung by the shop on my way to brunch, a now-or-never feeling in my heart. The jeweler had asked me to try it on before I left, but I knew if I did that, I would have started weeping. Which I didn’t want to do, not until I was safely and anonymously walking through Central Park.

  I know the ring probably fits perfectly. It’s beautiful and tragic. I can’t bring myself to take it out of the box.

  “We would have been really unhappy,” I say to Meg and Rufus. It helps to say it aloud.

  “Eh, happiness is overrated,” Meg says. “The first few years of parenting is like watching the man you used to want to fuck twenty-four/seven be slow-motion Frankensteined into a pastiche of every quality you loathe—”

  “Meg,” Rufus says, giving her a look. “We are here to instill hope, remember? That there’s something better out there?”

  “I’m just doing my due diligence,” Meg says. “In case the two of them get back together—”

  “We won’t get back together,” I say.

  “You sure?” Rufus says.

  “Real sure?” Meg asks.

  “I’m sure.” I stare at them. “What?”

  Rufus lets out a low whistle and makes eyes at Meg. “Well, then, we can move into the honesty portion of the brunch.”

  “What the hell have you been doing until now?” I demand.

  Just then, our server appears with an ice bucket of prosecco and a tray of shots. She’s peppy and ponytailed, and before she even sets the drinks down, all of us reach for the tequila and take it in a gulp. I gag a little, and also wish I had another.

  “Ohmigod, who just got engaged?” the server asks, bright as the glaring sun. She glances around at the three of us, trying to make sense of the dynamic. “That ring is gorgeous. I want one just like it someday!”

  “Take it,” I growl at her.

  She flinches, glances at Rufus as she fiddles with the foil on the prosecco. “Is she okay?”

  “Leave us,” Rufus whispers and eases the bottle out of the server’s hand.

  “Wait, before you go,” Meg says, making a stop sign with her hand. “We’ll take a large platter of all your pickles, deviled eggs, an order of fried chicken and French toast, and one deluxe French dip.”

  “Are you pregnant again?” Rufus asks, sizing up Meg.

  “Rufus, I just ordered enough alcohol to pickle all three of us. But, this was my go-to brunch when I was pregnant, and it is perfection, thank you very much.”

  As soon as the server walks away, I stare down both my friends. “Start talking. And not about pickles. You hated Ryan? All this time?”

  “No, no, we liked him,” Rufus says, his tone tactful. “He was a fabulous boyfriend. Capital F, capital B. Meg and I both appreciated the eye candy, especially that weekend at the Jersey Shore.”

  “Remember his red bathing suit?” Meg makes a sizzling sound. She’s already flushed from the tequila.

  “But,” Rufus says, “we’re . . . glad you’re not going to marry him.”

  “Was it just me,” Meg says, “or was he always looking for reasons you should quit your job?”