The door opened. D looked at me. I looked at D. Neither of us said anything useful. Then he reached out, took my wrist – not my hand, my wrist, which is a different thing entirely – pulled me inside and closed the door behind me with his foot. Not rough. Just certain. Like the…
Okay. So apparently a woman can spend seven stories building a strategic life plan and still accidentally give an Uber driver the worst possible address at 12:34 in the morning. I learned that Thursday. Against my will. Thursday was dinner with Richard. Which was excellent. Second dinner, same restaurant, same car, same Richard – attentive…
Claire says scarcity drives value. Claire says a lot of things that sound vaguely sociopathic until they turn out to be correct. So when Richard texted the morning after dinner I waited before responding. Not because I was busy. Not because I forgot. Because Claire said to. And because sometimes the plan requires sacrifice and…
Tonight was dinner with Richard. I spent three hours getting ready for a man I was absolutely, definitely, one hundred percent not emotionally invested in. The blowout held. The dress worked. The plan was intact. Which, in hindsight, should have made me more suspicious. The car arrived at seven forty-five. Not a cab. Not an…
Tomorrow is dinner with Richard. Which means tonight is research. And before anybody starts judging me, I would like the record to show that researching a man before agreeing to dinner is called being responsible. Researching his late wife at 1:14 in the morning while eating crackers over your laptop is called something else. Unfortunately…
It’s Thursday and I need to tell you about Richard. Not everything about Richard. Just the beginning. The beginning is the best part anyway. The beginning is where the plan is still clean and the spreadsheet makes sense and I haven’t done anything yet that complicates the columns. I found Richard the way I find…
Sunday. Just got home. I need to tell you about my friends. Not because they’re relevant to the plan – they’re not, technically – but because they’re the reason the plan exists and also the reason it will probably one day spectacularly collapse and you should probably know who’s who when that happens. There are…
Okay. So. There’s someone I need to tell you about before any of this makes sense. His name starts with D. That’s all you’re getting. D is the reason my spreadsheet has blind spots. Late twenties. Self-made but not yet made. There’s a difference. If you’ve ever dated potential instead of a portfolio, you know…
Hi. My name is Mila and I am looking for a husband. Not like – eventually, when it happens, when the universe sends me someone and I feel it in my chest and my friends cry at the wedding. No. I mean I am actively, deliberately, color-codedly looking for a husband. I have a spreadsheet….