Page 15 of Love in Focus

If Celeste and I weren’t already exes, it’d be like a meet-cute of a rom-com. But instead, it’s more like a car crash. An accidental encounter between two people who would rather not have been at the same place at the same time.

When the water grows cold, I get up from the tub, dry off, and change into pajamas. Then I slip into my childhood bed with my phone in one hand. Like I’ve been doing for the past few weeks, I search for and apply to “roommate wanted” listings in the city. There’s no way I can afford to live by myself in San Francisco, so this is the best I can do for now.

After I run out of listings to apply for, I end up flipping through people’s Instagram Stories and feel a slight sting of FOMO when I see Kiara, Val, and their other friends at aqueer Friendsgiving party. They all look so happy, an emotion that seems foreign to me right now.

I exit out of my friends’ stories to go to my own profile. Tragically, my last post was a picture of James and me laughing together while wine tasting in Napa with his parents in October. James’smomtook this picture. And both our faces—mine a little flushed from the alcohol—are so bright and cheery.

My big, gaudy engagement ring shines bright in the sunlight.

I pinch my phone screen with both hands to zoom into the picture, scrutinizing James’s smile. It looks sogenuine, which ironically makes me feel better about my situation. At least it isn’t obvious that James wanted to end our relationship. Or that he had any thoughts of doing so at all. Is it my fault that my ex either has the skills of an Emmy Award–winning actor or had a drastically sudden change of heart? My head hurts thinking about how, two weeks after this photo was taken, James would become just another ex.

I tap on the three dots in the top right corner and delete the photo.

Before I fully realize what I’m doing, I unblock Celeste on social media and navigate to her profile.

For the sake of my own mental well-being, I’d blocked her back when we first broke up. It’s almost comical how easy it is to unblock her now, after eight years of keeping her tightly locked away in my past.

We’re not following each other now, of course, but her account is public, so I can still see everything. I’m surprisedto see that she has over five hundredthousandfollowers. When we dated, she didn’t even have five hundred. I scroll through countless beautifully shot portraits, breathtaking pictures of Californian landscapes, and various promotional shoots with stunningly gorgeous models. I spot Gretchen in one of the shots, her long auburn hair glowing as she looks out at the Big Sur coastline during sunset.

So that’s how they met.

I keep scrolling until Celeste’s posts begin to blur together. Some naive part of me hopes that if I go far enough, I’ll find the reason why Celeste left me so many years ago.

But of course, I don’t.

Instead, toward the end of her page, I spot a picture that’s practically a jump-scare. A selfie of Celeste and me, back in college, her lips gently pressed against my forehead as we lie together on a picnic blanket. Celeste is taking the photo, and I still remember the words she said as she snapped it: “Just commemorating how much I love my beautiful girlfriend.”

We both look likebabies, or at least, that’s how we appear to present-day, twenty-nine-year-old me. Our cheeks are flushed and still round with baby fat, and neither Celeste nor I has a single visible wrinkle on our faces. I’d turned twenty-one a few months before this photo, and I remember thinking I was a real adult, now that I could legally drink. Which is entirely laughable to me now.

I thought I had everything figured out then, since by that point, Celeste and I were talking about “grown-upthings” like a getting a place together in Koreatown after graduation. Just like twenty-nine-year-old me had no idea James Matheson would suddenly break off our engagement, twenty-one-year-old me had no idea Celeste would upend our lives and disappear.

By the time I close Instagram for the night, I’ve made my decision.

I can’t work with Celeste until I know why she disappeared on me eight years ago. And I know just the place we can meet to talk about everything.

The next Friday at around eight p.m., I enter through the doors of the Irishman’s Jig, an Irish pub in San Francisco that my friends and I usually go to for St. Patrick’s Day. Because I don’t regularly frequent Irish pubs, I have no idea what they even do on normal weekdays, but it’s the least romantic spot I could think of for Celeste and me to meet. And it’s a fun enough place that I can’t imagine myself crying in here if things go wrong. Or at least, I hope I won’t.

Since it’s the first week of December, the Irishman’s Jig is decked out with Christmas lights, bright tinsel, and nutcracker statues. A handful of college students in red Santa suits and green elf costumes tune their fiddles and flutes on the stage. I watch them for a moment before looking around for Celeste.

When we were in college, Celeste was always perpetuallyearly for everything, so I’m not surprised to see her already sitting in the back corner of the pub like she’s a regular. Maybe she is. Just thinking about how we’ve been in the same state for all these years, possibly frequenting the same places but at different times, makes my heart race. That’s one piece of knowledge I wish I never found out about.

Today, Celeste looks gorgeous, even though she’s just wearing a black leather jacket over a simple white shirt and jeans. I breathe a sigh of relief. I don’t think I can survive another encounter with those ridiculously sexy tattoos of hers. I barely resisted the urge to run my fingers across her skin the last time I saw her.

When she sees me, Celeste holds up a hand in the air. I can’t even meet her gaze without blushing. Which is an absolutely fan-fucking-tastic start. Eight years later and she still has that effect on me. I’m almost thirty and yet, around her, I’m a shy college kid again, my cheeks turning red whenever I accidentally make eye contact with my beautiful roommate.

“The Irishman’s Jig, huh?” Celeste asks when I sit down across the table from her.

“A proud and historic establishment of the city, first opened in 1972.” I point at the sign above the door that says just that.

“Ah, yes. The seventies. How historic,” she says dryly, before nodding her head at the musicians behind me. “They’re going to have a live performance soon. Are you okay with that?”

I purse my lips. The truth is, I hadn’t even consideredthe possibility of there being a performance on a normal weekday night. But itisa Friday, so maybe I should have known better. I shrug as nonchalantly as I can. “Sure, why not? We can take breaks from talking to watch, I guess. And go somewhere else if it gets too bad.”

Celeste frowns. “Okay, then.”

I clear my throat. “Before we work together, I need to go over some things with you.”

Her eyebrows shoot up. “All right. What things?”

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