“Harry is one of those guys who wants to be married by the time we graduate. That’s what his parents did. And I know that’s what he wants.”

“What do you want?” I almost add, “Isn’t that what we’ve always talked about … finding our Prince Charmings and riding off into the sunset?”

“I don’t know. I feel there’s so much I haven’t experienced yet. We’ve been together for like, five, six months? His mother includes me in her biweekly family newsletter.”

“Shut up. She does not!”

Rae pulls up the Trash folder in the email app on her phone. “This was last week’s.” She points to one line in particular that says, “We can’t wait to see what the future brings for our Harry and his love, Rae. We’re not saying wedding bells yet, but ding-dong!”

My eyes get so wide they might as well pop out of their sockets.

“Yeah,” she says. “Exactly my reaction. It’s just … a lot.”

“Do you love him?”

She avoids my gaze. “I don’t know.” Her voice is small. “How did you know that you loved, you know …”

She won’t say Jack’s name, which I sort of appreciate, but it just makes me so deeply, devastatingly sad all over again. I don’t want to tiptoe around Jack’s name; I’d rather forget him entirely so that I can breathe again.

“This feeling in my bones. The safety I felt. The way he looked at me as if I were the only one who mattered. His smile. The poems he wrote me. I didn’t care about anything or anyone as long as he was around. Something like that doesn’t just happen. And it doesn’t just vanish, either.” I don’t realize I’m crying until she wipes away my tears.

“I don’t feel that with Harry,” she says. “Does that mean something?”

We both sit in silence for a long, long time, neither one of us knowing the answer. Or at least not wanting to admit it out loud.

The campus center dining hall is so crowded that I breathe a sigh of relief. So many parents are dining here that I feel like I can slip under the radar, completely unnoticed.

Rae, Benny, and I slog through the buffet lines and snake our way around bumbling parents and screaming kids, and holy shit, I hate absolutely everyone right now!

“There’re no open spots. I wanna set this place on fire,” Benny says, clearly irritated. “Oh, wait, there’s Rhett.” Benny’s hand shoots up, and he immediately beelines toward him. Rae and I follow, but the closer we get, the more scared Rhett looks, his head twitching, eyeballs darting side to side.

Suddenly I see why.