The trouble is, I’m realizing how much in my apartment speaks volumes about me. Volumes that I don’t want Noah Ross to hear. My vintage bar cart, for example, boasting BD’s blown glass cocktail shaker, martini set, and the collection of bespoke vermouths left over from the New Year’s Eve party when Rufus and I went a little too nuts on Negronis. I stare at it now for ten minutes, wondering if its prominent place in my living room says your editor knows how to have fun or your editor knows how to black out on a Monday night. I wheel it all the rattling way into my bedroom before I realize that if, on the off chance, Noah Ross were to open my bedroom door, thinking it was the bathroom, it would be way worse for him to see my bedside speakeasy.

Then there’s my bookshelf. My carefully curated pride and joy, whose space is so limited I feel it keeps me honest. But now I’m wondering: Is it serious enough? Is it light enough? Is it diverse enough? Is it classic enough? Are Noa Callaway’s books prominent enough? Are they too prominent?

Noah is going to be looking at this shelf and forming opinions about it, about me. We’re book people. It’s what we do. Should I try to make room for the copy of War and Peace I use as a doorstop in my closet?

“I know it looks like I’m losing my mind,” I say to Alice, who is glaring at the robot vacuum from the safety of her dog bed. “But sometimes, this is what being a boss looks like.”

Noah is supposed to arrive at three o’clock, when the south-facing windows of my living room let in their softest light. By two-fifty, I’ve changed out of sweats and into a white peasant blouse and what Meg calls my “adult jeans,” because they need to be ironed. Though I’m tempted to put on the Fendi suit again, just to fuck with him.

I’ve got my French press packed with freshly ground espresso, a clean fridge chilling whole milk, and almond milk, and damn it, I bought something called oat milk, too—okay, Terry? I’ve got Pellegrino and a box of pastries from the only bakery in midtown Aude finds edible. All that and a stomach full of nerves.

I don’t know whether my Fifty Ways plan is actually going to work, but that’s not even on today’s menu of worries. Today is about getting him to agree to try it out.

At two fifty-eight, I position myself at my bedroom window, overlooking the entrance to my building. I may or may not be hiding behind my ficus plant when a black town car slows to a stop on the street below.