Chapter 1
My longest relationship only lasted five months. Does that count? Can I say I’ve been in a long-term relationship? I’ve almost been in a long-term relationship.
When I was in that short long-term relationship, I had a clear vision of my future, of our future together. I could see a path with clear milestones I wanted to walk.
Now single, feat. my unstable gaping black hole of a love life, when I try to picture myself in five years—I can’t.
My future’s woefully out of focus. An indistinguishable blob of maybes and what-ifs.
Trying to visualize it in my mind’s eye is akin to shaking one of those stupid magic eight balls and seeing the words Try Again Later float to the surface every fucking time.
My future never used to be a blur. I’m a planner.
I’ve always had hard-set goals ahead, grounding me in purpose.
Guiding my choices. Each one a stepping stone en route to a successful life.
I’m ambitious, resourceful, and pretty feisty.
I’ve yet to come up short on one of those babies.
Until today, obviously. I missed my love deadline.
The lack of control I have over this facet of life is infuriating. When is the universe going to meet me halfway? I don’t think anyone’s ever been this persistent on Hinge for such an extensive length of time. Six straight months? They should give awards for that.
My various jobs have cumulatively proven to repel men.
Each of the six, one-month relationship-ish things I dove headfirst into this year—crashed and burned once I started opening up about what I do. Don’t ask me how many times I’ve been ghosted in a Hinge chat after sharing that I write the relationship column for The New York Minute.
(Eleven. Eleven times.)
The fact that I write under a pseudonym doesn’t seem to move the needle on the lack of enthusiasm. No one wants to date the woman publicly dissecting her romantic endeavors for the second-largest paper on the Eastern Seaboard.
Also, I’m cursed.
My name, Rikki, is old Norse for “forever alone.”
I’m not kidding.
Richard and Kelli didn’t bother doing research on the atrocity they were concocting between their two names. Rikki. They thought they were being cute, smashing their consonants together.
I discovered the meaning via the internet for a school project in second grade.
Not a fun day. When I presented it to the class, my then-crush yelled out finally something accurate, and I had to excuse myself so I could go to the bathroom and cry.
So began the Rikki curse. And so it continues today.
Recent highlights include:
(a) Ted, the aforementioned five monther. He works in my office, so I still have to see his face regularly.
(b) Sal, a firefighter I dated back in February. He was suddenly “needed for a fire” on our way to the restaurant for our fifth date. He dropped me back at my apartment, and I never heard from him again.
(c) Neil, the hot scientist I was banking on bringing to Whitney’s wedding. Post date five, he was poached by the government for a classified project and relocated to DC.
I could keep going. The Rikki curse is ever present and relishes the number five.
“What part are you at?”
I blink away from the darkness outside my window.
“Huh?” I turn to Jordyn. Her makeup still looks great.
It’s 1:30 a.m. I have to get the name of her primer.
My “smoky eyes” have smeared up my forehead via careless, stress-induced face touching.
I jolted at my reflection in the plane bathroom mirror twenty minutes ago.
I look like the Pattinson Batman when he takes off the mask.
“Where are you in Heir of Fire?” Jordyn clarifies. We host a biweekly witch-themed book club. As always, Jordyn’s ahead of me in the reading.
I glance down at the large green book on my drop-down table. “I finally got to the part with the witches, but they were such assholes, I put it down.”
We’ve been reading Throne of Glass. One of our four members insisted there were witches in this series, despite there being no mention of them in the book-one synopsis.
We’re a witch-book book club, and we’ve spent our last two meetings chatting about assassins and fae. It’s been a very off-brand summer.
“Keep going! I have things I need to chat about.”
I flick the book. It hurts my nail. “I’m kind of too bummed out to read.”
Jordyn sighs. “Rikki, no one noticed you didn’t have a plus-one. They were too busy laughing about your dress.” The bride had to stand next to me, physically holding it closed while I delivered my six-minute toast.
“Jordyn. I was wandering the perimeter of the room, like the ghost of dead spinsters past, during every slow song.”
Jordyn laughs. “Yeah, well, we were dancing, so we didn’t notice. And now you get to find a way to write about it. Your angst won’t go to waste.”
I roll my eyes. That room was full of family. They all know what I do for a living. They all noticed, and they all asked. Jordyn repositions herself to see me better, and I catch a quick glimpse of Micah snoring in the aisle seat on her left.
“Rick, you organized a gorgeous wedding. Your cousin was on cloud nine. I know today was hard, but it’s done.
You killed it. Tomorrow will be better. You don’t have to play wedding planner.
You’re not the maid of honor. You won’t have to juggle family.
You can let go—celebrate your birthday! Celebrate freedom from Whitney’s weaponized incompetence! It’s gonna be fun.”
We have another wedding tomorrow. On the East Coast. Another wedding where I checked yes on the plus-one card (I know).
I twist toward the window, closing my eyes as the sluggish tug of failure saturates my bloodstream.
The soulmate search takes up so much mental capital.
Looking for the one is a contrarian mission.
It requires an almost-comical level of optimism packed snug and warm under an equally thick blanket of cynicism.
That’s the only way you make it through the slew of duds, dickheads, and misfires you encounter along the way.
Give everyone the benefit of the doubt, but laugh it off when they let you down.
Trust no one, but keep looking for someone to trust.
Take everything with a grain of salt, but keep taking it.
Everyone’s an asshole, but eventually someone won’t be!
Six hours later, my luggage and I push into my new box-laden one-bedroom apartment.
I invested in new bags before this trip because my second round of Marshalls discount luggage self-destructed during my last flight.
A-plus decision on my part because it made spotting my shit at baggage claim a breeze.
I can’t help grinning as I lower it to the floor to unpack.
It’s one of those Away bags everyone raves about.
A limited edition turquoise-green Sunrise Away bag the exact color of the default WordArt gradient I used to use in school back in the early 2000s.
Between the ages of nine and eleven, I spent an extensive amount of time typing up “articles” reporting on the “relationship” drama going on in my classes, using Microsoft Word.
I printed them out with big WordArt headlines, slid them into plastic paper protectors, and stored them in a neon-green three-ring binder.
A three-ring binder I proudly carried everywhere, touting to anyone who’d listen that it contained my “work samples.” When I look at this bag, I think of that ambitious nine-year-old girlie, and it makes me happy.
My brow furrows as I flop the suitcase open. My curling iron isn’t in the zipper compartment. My meticulously curated neon-green packing cubes are nowhere to be found. My retainer is not in the little pouch I so carefully stashed on the left-hand side.
This bag is full of someone else’s shit.