Mary sighed. “So, yeah. I had the shop to tend to and Sebastian and Matty to take care of. And then when things started getting better with them, I had Tyler and Sebastian to keep me company. A few years after Cora died, I did start dating again. This guy named Doug.”

Doug. What kind of shit-stupid name was Doug? Doug sounded like a telemarketer. He sounded like he wore dirty socks too many days in a row. Doug sounded like a boring, lifeless prick.

John cleared his throat, a little surprised at his own internal vehemence. “Ah, what was Doug like?” He didn’t give a shit what Doug was like, but he had to say something.

Mary cocked her head to one side and thought for a minute. “The life of every party. Gregarious. Friendly. Great first impression.”

Oh. Great. Literally everything that John wasn’t. “Uh-huh.”

“Cora would have sniffed him out immediately.”

“Sniffed him out for what?”

“For being disingenuous. She had a bloodhound nose for that kind of thing. And a zero-tolerance policy. She would have known right away that I shouldn’t have wasted my time on him.” Mary sighed. “I thought he was great, however. He was just so fun. And it had been a long time since I’d had any fun. And it had been a long time since I’d had somebody who thought I was the most special, out of everybody else. Cora and Tiff, they were both such persistent cheerleaders. They both thought I was the crème de la crème. They gave me such confidence on a daily basis. I hadn’t realized I’d missed that until I had Doug in my corner.”

John took a long drink of beer. “So, what ended up happening?”

Mary sighed. “He was sleeping with someone else.” Her eyes dropped. “A woman in her young twenties. Though he’s my age. They’re still together. I see them around Cobble Hill sometimes and... You know, I wish it didn’t bother me. I really do. But it just does.” Her eyes stayed down. “I’m not naive. I know that it’s considered weird in our culture to be a woman and thirty-seven and childless and never been married. But I wasn’t interested in either of those things in my twenties. A lot in part because of how much my mother pressured me to get interested.” She laughed, somewhere between humor and disdain. “Cora had Matty, so I had my baby fix whenever I wanted it. And then, out of nowhere, both Tiff and Cora were gone, and life happened, and grief happened, and then Doug happened, and here we are, six years later, and I’m finally starting to think about wanting a partner and find out I’m over the hill.”

I was expecting someone younger.