“Any step away from the past is a step in the right direction,” she says.
“I guess,” I say. “I’m just worried it’s going to be a shitty experience, and then I’ll feel worse about everything.”
“Why? Are you not happy as you are? With how things are?”
“I mean, kind of. Not really.”
She sighs. “You don’t need a boyfriend, darling. You need perspective.”
“Probably.”
“Does the coffee taste funny to you today? It tastes funny to me.” And with that, the subject is changed.
I don’t think about the date again until the next day, when Jill comes prancing into my classroom wearing a bat costume. Apparently, the staff was meant to dress up for Halloween—information I might have learned if I cared enough to pay attention to memos, which I don’t.
“What are you?” she asks me.
“Forgetful.”
She laughs. “You’re so funny. I told Pascal how funny you are.”
“No pressure.”
“You want a Mounds?” She offers me a fun-sized candy bar. I take it. It’s very warm. Molten inside its wrapper. “I have good news. You have plans Friday.”
“Cool.”
“With me! And my husband, Dan. And who knows? Maybe your future husband. Pascal!”
“Again, no pressure.”
“Seven work for you? Have you been to Rhineland?”
“No.”
“You’re going to love it. They have this cheese dip appetizer that might be my favorite thing ever. So seven?”
“Yep. See you there,” I say, instead of what I want to say, which is Kill me now.
“Great!” She hands me another Mounds before flapping out of my classroom.
As soon as she leaves, Madison enters. She’s always early.
“No costume?” she asks. She’s wearing Ouija board knee socks and a blouse patterned with skulls.
“No,” I say. I toss her the Mounds.
“Here,” I say flatly. “Happy Halloween.”
The rest of the week I spend every spare minute brainstorming viable excuses I could use to get out of dinner. A variety of illnesses. A head cold. A chest cold. The flu. Allergies. Strep throat. A stomach virus. Food poisoning. Pink eye. Ringworm. Or maybe the death of a relative? I have a lot of dead relatives. It wouldn’t be a lie to say that my grandpa died. It was six years ago, but he did die.
I wasn’t raised religious, but a common warning from my grandmother （still alive） is that you get out what you put into the universe. The ole “What goes around comes around.” Karma.
Since things already aren’t going so hot for me, I can’t risk any cosmic consequences.
By Thursday afternoon, I’ve resigned myself to going.
When I get home, I open my closet, readying myself for a long, frustrating solo fashion show in which I get to confront how terrible I look in everything I own, but instead I find a new dress hanging front and center. It’s a deep yellowy gold. Crushed velvet. V-neck, A-line.
I try it on. It’s a perfect fit. There’s never been a more flattering dress.
There’s a note tucked into the sleeve.
To what’s ahead. Have fun on your date. XO, Sophie
I’m so moved by the gesture I could cry.
The dress reframes the way I look at the date. It could be fun. That’s a possibility. Pascal could be really hot. He could be nice and smart and charming. We could hit it off. He could want the same things that I want. Maybe we’ll get married at the courthouse and have an intimate brunch after. Maybe we’ll honeymoon in Barcelona, hold hands and kiss in the streets, have strangers come up to us to tell us how in love we look. Maybe we’ll buy an old house with character, with good bones, and we’ll fix it up ourselves, then post pictures so people can marvel at the before and after.
Maybe we’ll have a tradition of sleeping in late on Sundays, and we’ll wake up in each other’s arms just shy of noon, spooning so we don’t have to endure morning breath.
What if I get to have one of those great stories? Like how some couples talk about how they met, like how he found her glove and then chased after her and then they kissed in the snow and the rest was history? I could say I was with someone for almost ten years who I thought was my soul mate, but then we broke up and I moved here and got set up on a blind date and found my actual soul mate.
I look at myself in the mirror, in this dress, and it’s hard not to feel a spark of hope. It’s impossible not to consider the chance.