CHAPTER 15
TREY
The next friend dinner happened in Brooklyn.
Marcus chose the restaurant.
Nia arrived late.
Danielle arrived with Anthony.
Paula stared.
Anthony lifted both hands.
Three hours at a table could reveal more than a month of carefully planned dates.
Careers came up, but so did bad landlords, aging parents, divorces, money mistakes, old college stories, and the petty grievances friends preserved for sport.
Danielle and Anthony kept finding reasons to address each other directly.
Marcus noticed and wisely said nothing. Nia noticed and had no such restraint.
Trey sat back with one hand around his glass and watched the circles of their lives begin to overlap without anyone formally announcing that it was happening.
“We came from the same meeting.”
Danielle said, “Do not start.”
Paula looked at Trey.
Trey immediately said, “No matchmaking.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
The table filled.
Marcus told a story from Paula’s crisis-management days involving a nonprofit executive, a broken teleprompter and a donor who had accidentally livestreamed an argument.
Paula covered her face.
“That story is classified.”
Marcus laughed. “You threatened to throw the teleprompter out a window.”
“It was malfunctioning.”
“You were on the thirty-second floor.”
“Details.”
Trey loved hearing about Paula before him.
Not because he wished he had been there.
Because it reminded him she had a whole life he had not authored.
Nia talked about leaving assistant work behind and deciding what came next professionally.
Danielle challenged her.
“What do you actually want?”
Nia shrugged. “That’s the problem.”
Paula said, “Not knowing yet isn’t failure.”
Nia looked at her.
Trey noticed the irony.
Paula, queen of five-year plans, telling someone uncertainty was survivable.
Growth looked good on her.
Anthony and Danielle argued again.
This time about a neighborhood rezoning.
Marcus whispered to Trey, “Are they always like this?”
“Yes.”
“Are they dating?”
“No.”
Across the table Danielle said, “I can hear you.”
Marcus smiled. “Good.”
Paula laughed.
For three hours the romance was not the plot.
Friendship was.
Careers.
Divorce.
Family.
Money.
Ambition.
Bad dates.
Anthony’s daughter.
Nia’s uncertainty.
Marcus’s new client.
Danielle’s refusal to date men who described themselves as “alpha.”
At that, Paula choked on her drink.
Trey looked at her.
Danielle noticed.
“Oh?”
Paula pointed. “No.”
Nia’s eyes widened.
Anthony said, “What did I miss?”
“Nothing,” Trey and Paula said together.
The table exploded.
Trey closed his eyes.
He would never know peace again.