I chewed on a nail, manicure be damned.

Patrice Vasquez
New York, New York

I’m with Paula. More details about Finn and the real-life romantic comedy, please!

I bit off the nail and spit it into my hand before tucking it into a napkin with some pretzel crumbs.

Laura Olsen
Warwick, New York

Puleeze. My small town is just like the movies: cozy, warm, and perfect. Adina is another snobby Manhattanite bragging about how fabulous the city is. Go home, Carrie Bradshaw. Sex and the City was canceled a long time ago.

Oh, go fuck yourself, Laura Olsen.

Kate Park
New York, New York

This was one of the best essays I’ve ever read in Tea. The author is so open and honest about her journey, and while I’m personally devastated to learn not all small towns are picture-perfect, I admire the author for taking the time to find out and for putting herself out there. That Finn fellow would be a dumbass not to call her PRONTO. Please publish more of Adina Gellar’s stories, as she’s a writer to watch!

I blew a kiss at the screen. I love you too, Kate.

By the time I got to the bottom, three more comments had popped up. It was an almost equal mix of insulting (“how pathetic”), mushy (“how sweet”), and nosy (“how about a sequel?”) remarks. I wasn’t about to put a crown on my head and proclaim myself queen of the personal essay, but I had no desire to jump out of our four-story apartment to end it all either.

I minimized the story, set the timer for another sixty minutes, and refocused on my pitch. By the end of the hour, I’d found one more colleagues-to-lovers couple and felt confident I had enough material to put something together to send to Derek, or, if he canceled me, another editor.

I refreshed my story again and blinked. The number of comments had more than doubled in the last hour to 117. I allowed myself to imagine one of them was from Finn saying he also wanted to talk. Logically, I knew the chances of him reading the story, much less leaving a comment, were slim, but as the feedback grew in quantity, so did the strength of my wishful thinking.

Candace Fink
New York, New York

Now that you’ve ruined the fantasy of small towns for the rest of us, I hope you feel better.

So much better, Candace. Thank you!

Red Sox fan
Boston, Massachusetts

Was this a story or a poorly disguised advertisement for New York City? Is “Finn” the code name for your useless mayor?

Ouch.

Kate Park
New York, New York

The commenters above can bite me. I’m sure the author has way better taste in men.

I chuckled while fighting the urge to text Kate to focus on her job so she could go home and study as planned. My selfish need for her ferocious loyalty was all-encompassing.