Page 4 of One Week Wingman

And then one day I was sitting in a lecture, struggling to stay awake and take notes because a) I’d stayed up until 3AM prepping for another class, and b) our professor had a monotone and a cough, and a girl I was sort of friendly with, but not an actual friend (there wasn’t time for friends), tapped me on the shoulder and passed me a Kleenex.

I’d been crying and I didn’t even realize it.

Something in me just snapped. I got up and walked out of the lecture theatre that day, and I never went back. I dropped out of law school, started bartending to make rent, and found out that I was actually good at it. Mixing drinks, making friends. I thought it was just a temporary thing, until I figured out my next chapter, but it’s been a couple of years now, and… I’m still shaking up a mean Martini.

And I’m happy. Happy enough, anyway. I’ve got good friends, zero student debt, and you’d be surprised how much tip money you can sock away serving craft beers to finance bros on a Friday night. I give music lessons on the side, and one of these days I might find the guts to perform my own songs at an open mic night. But it’s not the high-powered career me—or my parents—dreamed about. And heading back to Connecticut for this reunion…?

Well, it just reminds me how many of my big dreams have come to nothing.

My phone rings with theGilmore Girlstheme, which can be only one person: my mom. Whether she’s an Emily or a Lorelei depends on the day.

“Are you packed?” she says excitedly when I answer. “I have your old room all made up. It’s been so long since you visited!”

“I came for your birthday in August,” I point out with a smile, getting up to go get started on that packing.

“That was just for the weekend,” she tuts. “Not realquality time. Isn’t it convenient your reunion is the same week as our big anniversary?”

“Uh huh,” I reply, sifting through my laundry pile. She and my stepdad are celebrating fifteen years of marriage, and so have planned a big blow-out party—for the same day as the reunion. She figured since everyone would be in town for one event, they could come to two. Just another reason I can’t bail on this whole debacle. I try to sound more cheerful. “It’s going to be great!”

“And we’re thrilled to finally meet Stefano,” my mom adds, chatting happily.

I stop, my stomach lurching. Stefano?

Oh.No.

“Mom, I’m so sorry,” I blurt quickly. “I was going to tell you. He can’t make it.”

“What?” Mom’s wail of disappointment could be heard clear all the way to Vermont. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting him for so long!”

“I know, but… He had a work thing,” I lie. “A last-minute emergency. One of the charity’s well projects collapsed. In Peru.”

“Oh,” Mom’s voice changes. “I hope everyone’s OK?”

“They’re fine,” I reassure her. “But Stefano has to fly in and deal with the clean-up this week. You know how he is, the first to help out in a crisis.”

“He’s so generous with his time,” Mom says approvingly. “Still, I wish he could have made it.”

“Next time,” I promise, and say my goodbyes, finally hanging up.

I sink back on my bed with a sigh. Is that guilt gnawing away beneath my rib cage? Most definitely. Mom has been bugging me for months to meet my boyfriend, Stefano, and why wouldn’t she?

He’s every woman’s dream. We met when we both went for the same cab in a hailstorm. He chivalrously insisted take it, I suggested we share, and by the time the cab dropped me at home, we were madly in love.

He cooks, he cleans, he buys me thoughtful little gifts, he’s a god in the bedroom, and selflessly works for an international non-profit, designing clean water projects in far-flung locations. He’sliterallyMr. Right.

It’s a shame he doesn’t actually exist.

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ROXY

Stefano...

Oh, Stefano. He wasn’t meant to be a big lie. Just a little one. A teeny-tiny, pocket-sized, convenient little fiction to make my life easier—and to keep my mom from looking at me with that hint of disappointment in her eyes.

It started last year, I was home for the holidays, fending off ‘concerned’ questions about my future plans, or lack thereof. My stepsister, Daisy, was being perfect as always (she’d just hit a million followers on her Instagram account, chronicling the cozy charm of small-town life) and everyone was acting like my bartending gig had me hovering one step from the gutter and total failure.

So, it just… Slipped out. Stefano. My perfect boyfriend. My perfect volunteer firefighter-slash-charity worker boyfriend. Who I totally made up.

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