Page 11 of The Lodge

My cheeks feel hot even as I say his name. I guess it really has been an embarrassingly long time since I’ve had plans with a guy one-on-one, even something as innocuous as a ski lesson.

“Oh, Tyler’s great!” she says, eyes lighting up. “He comes in pretty much every day. First time I met him, he told me to surprise him, so I made him the weirdest combo I could think of. He kept a totally straight face—he drank the entire thing, as if a quad-shot peppermint-hazelnut latte with matcha powder wasexactlywhat he was craving.”

“That sounds terrible!”

Suddenly the plain black coffee seems more appealing than before.

“Oh, it was bad.” She grins. “But now it’s like a game between us—he always tells me to surprise him, and I always try to get a reaction out of him with disgusting drinks. He wins every time.”

I laugh. “He sounds like a lot of fun, honestly.”

“Best part of my day by a mile,” she says, with one last wipe of the table. “Keeps things interesting around here.”

A bell on the café door jingles as another customer comes in; Makenna gives me a little wave before heading back over to the bar.

My own words echo in my head:He sounds like a lot of fun.

It’s been years since a thought like that has invaded my mind.

Two years, specifically.

Ever since Blake, I’ve closed myself off to the possibility of dating. Why put myself in the position to be strung along by a guy who takes himself—andeverything—way too seriously? All he and his Wall Street finance bros cared about was themselves: if they looked good, if they felt good.

Well. That and their money.

It took me way too long to see it.

At first, all I saw was Blake’s (admittedly gorgeous) exterior: tall, dark, and handsome with bespoke suits to match; a Manhattan apartment that’s been featured in more than one movie; flashy themed parties every Halloween, Christmas, and New Year’s Eve. He took me on the fanciest dates, where the fanciest people would see us being fancy together—so many yachts and galas and impossible dinner reservations.

Chloe was dating one of Blake’s friends at the time. The Wall Street bros never dated anyone longer than a few weeks—Chloe and I were rarities. We became fast friends, seeking each other out when the nights inevitably devolved into conversations we couldn’t care less about, all Scotch and stocks and sports cars. I often felt distant from Blake after he’d had a few drinks—we went through too many cycles of him saying things that cut deep, then swearing he didn’t mean them the next morning. Daylight always made his shadows disappear, always made me wonder if my unsavory feelings were real or just left over from a bad dream.

The beginning of the end was when I caught Chloe’s boyfriend cheating on her one New Year’s Eve. She was home in Ohio taking care of her mom who had a bad case of the flu, which somehow made her boyfriend’s indiscretions seem all the more heinous.

When I told Blake about it, he shrugged it off.

The glittering, twinkling aura I’d come to associate with their whole group sharpened into blinding focus in that instant. His unbothered reaction said everything—he wouldn’t think twice about doing the same thing to me.

I asked him point-blank if he’d ever cheated on me.

He had. And he didn’t even try to look sorry.

How had I not seen it?

Nothing about our year together was great, in hindsight, but one of the worst parts was that it did considerable damage to my confidence that I could accurately judge a man’s character. Everything seemed so obvious in the rearview, but Blake’s charisma had blurred my ability to see it as it was happening—and thatterrifiedme. How would I ever trust myself to not make the same mistake all over again?

Chloe has reassured me a thousand times that anyone could have fallen for Blake’s act. That their whole group was full of selfish, manipulative gaslighters, and how our boyfriends treated us was no reflection on who we are—that none of it was our fault, that we were young and naive like so many other New Yorkers who go through a finance bro phase. Chloe always insists there are a million other guys out there who would be equally horrified by their behavior.

Iwantto believe her.

I want to believe I could find someone good. That I could trust myself when I think I’ve found one and have it turn out to be true.

In the meantime, I’ve sworn off men who take themselves andtheir money too seriously, men who don’t care how rotten their souls are so long as they’re perceived as attractive and desirable.

Chloe’s taken the opposite approach: she’s gone on over a hundred first dates in the last two years, but never lets them get anywhere close to serious. She worries I’ve closed myself offtoomuch. And the fact that my upcoming ski lesson feels like a potential date based purely on the merit that it will involve one-on-one time with a man—well—

I admit it probably means Chloe is right.

Today is for the Chloe approach: nothing too serious, nothing to overthink about—just me and the mountain and the hot guy who’s going to remind me how not to crash into a tree.

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