“Not yet. You preempted it.” I chuckled. When she didn’t join in, a chill went through me. “Just rip off the Band-Aid.”

“I searched for him on OkCupid.”

“You…what? I have so many questions. The first being why do you have an OkCupid account? Are you and Diego in an open relationship now?”

“Diego knows all about it. He says hi by the way.”

“Hi, Diego!” I stood and opened the bathroom door a crack. My mouth watered at the sight of a bare-chested Finn watching TV on his bed. I closed the door again and whispered, “You’ve answered my first question. Now answer my second. Why?”

“I’m in denial about failing the bar and needed a diversion.”

“Fair enough. But there are millions of men in the city. What was your strategy?”

“I downloaded the app and made a fake bare-bones profile. You said he was twenty-eight and lived on the Upper West Side, so I searched for twenty-eight-year-old white guys within a five-mile radius of the 10023 zip code. Diego did the same thing, but on Tinder. I also searched him on social media so I knew what he looked like. He’s hot, by the way.”

“Wow. You roped Diego into this harebrained scheme with you? You can tell me later what you promised in exchange for his efforts.” I braced myself. “So…uh…you found him?”

“We had to swipe left on hundreds of profiles, but yes.” She clucked her tongue. “Let me just say that I still think there are plenty of men in New York City craving a serious relationship, and they’re not all like Leo et al., but…um…I don’t think Finn is one of them. I took a screenshot of his bio if you want to see it.”

I took a steeling inhale. “Send it to me.” My voice came out in a whisper.

“Okay. Hold on a second.” She kept talking. “This is all my fault. You were so ‘If he wanted a girlfriend, he’d have one,’ and I was all like, ‘Maybe he just hasn’t found the right girl yet. You could be her.’”

The way her voice went up an octave during “my” part would have been comical if I didn’t feel like I was going to throw up.

“I sent it.”

My nausea escalated. “Sorry in advance if I disconnect you by accident.” With a shaky hand, I went to my home screen and to my texts. I enlarged the attachment she’d sent. It was a close-up of Finn dressed in a medieval monk outfit in front of Burp Castle, a “whisper-only” bar in the city. Something warm exploded in my belly. He was such a dork. And I would have swiped right on him immediately.

Finn
28. Manhattan, NY
Straight, Man, Single, 6’1, average build.

I pictured Finn’s broad torso. We had two entirely different definitions of “average.” At least no one would accuse him of overreaching.