Though I was embarrassed by their utter vapidity, the couch paintings were profitable. I could bang out one of those in a couple of hours, depending on the medium and size. If it looked like something you’d buy at Target, so be it. I still got to sign my name and deposit a sizable check. I took down my website, since nothing I was doing needed to be immortalized in cyberspace.

I saw friends often and enjoyed the nights when I was alone, despite the urge to machete my way through Times Square on the way home every night. (Tourists taking pictures of neon signs should be thrown in jail. There. I was a true New Yorker.) I even dated a little. A slurry of first dates, one regrettable hookup, then a nice person named Sam. We dated for a few months—he was a funny guy who did something with the waste water of New York City. I liked him very much. We never had a bad time together. One night, when we’d been together long enough that we didn’t wonder if we were going to spend the weekend together, he said (in bed, no less), “I think I’m falling in love with you, Sadie.”

I replied with, “Oh, wow, that’s so . . . flattering.”

Thus ended Sam and me. I was grateful he broke it off before we got more entangled in each other’s lives. Breaking another heart was not something I could handle. And besides . . . I think I’m falling in love with you? Kind of tepid. I’d never had to ponder that with Noah. It was, to quote the great Stevie Wonder, signed, sealed, delivered. Done.

Once in a while, I’d check Gillian’s Facebook page. She was the kind of bride who gave me a rash—obsessed with the me-ness of the upcoming day. “Which bouquet do you like best?” she’d ask. Sure, sure, she was an event planner, but come on. She had Pinterest boards of dresses, bouquets, centerpieces, bridesmaid dresses. She had a bachelorette weekend with her twelve closest friends in Miami (those poor women . . . I imagined it cost them thousands), and every photo showed Gillian’s blinding white teeth in a near-feral smile. She wore a tiara that said BRIDE, in case we were unclear.

In short, she was milking every drop of attention she could possibly get, and while I tried not to hate her, I failed. She had a countdown to the wedding on all her pages. Every frickin’ day, she mentioned something wedding related, even posting a picture of the white corsety thing she’d be wearing under her gown. For Pete’s sake, as my mother would say.