She was leaner in the cheeks, muscled in the arms. Her hair was shorter, angled, streaked with chestnut brown, still thick. It was a good result, if you considered the countless ways time could affect people. I dredged her external appearance for signs of the gossip about her at Prachi’s party. What I saw: a woman, comfortably adult. Straight-from-work attire. Quick, evaluating expression. Having located her there, I immediately granted her, once more, power over me. Highly functional, decisive, competent women have always compelled me. The world is enough for them, and they are enough for the world.

“I’m wrong,” she said, sitting down. I realized we hadn’t hugged, so I leaned over, but we were on barstools and mine was uneven, and I sort of toppled, and she stopped me with her knee. We tried again. A real hug. Warmth. Even a bit of an up-down stroke of her flat palm on my upper back. “You do look different. Older, but also…” She paused, reassessing.

I took it up for her. “Weathered. Wiser. More gallant?” I said. “Wiser? Philosophical.”

A full laugh erupted, like a hiccup. “Looser. That’s what I mean. Looser. I always think that when I see people from high school, you know? I saw your friend Wendi Zhao one time at this sushi place on Castro Street and she was slouching a little. She never slouched.”

“Never.”

“Oh, and Manu!”

“I see him sometimes.”

“He’s lovely. Super successful, and now he’s getting very political, isn’t he?”

“I think that’s relative. The political part.”

Anita was trying to catch the bartender’s eye and missed my response. “I like their Napa chardonnay. A little oaky, but.”

“You know wine? Classy.”

“The basic adjectives. My college roommates only want to hang out by taking these wine tours of Sonoma, and if I want to have any social life at all, well.”

I ordered an Anchor Steam. The bartender poured Anita’s chardonnay and cranked the tap forward for my beer. Anita pressed her knuckles to the glass and frowned. “I’m sorry, but it’s warm,” she said. The bartender nodded rigidly, and went back for a more properly chilled bottle.

“Neil,” she said, after taking a sip of the corrected drink, “I’m truly glad to see you.”

“Me, too.”

“I’m sorry it was so long.”

“Me, too.”

“I didn’t mean for it to be so long, but you look up and all this time’s gone by.” She blinked. Her eyes, though wide, with a tendency to catch the light, revealed little about her emotions—as though something constricted them from behind the pupils. “How’s your sister?”

“Settled, as my dad says. My mom’s over the moon about the wedding.”

“Is she chasing after you about your turn?”

I grimaced. “I’m far from that—what was it you said? The way opposite of engaged?”

Her lips quivered, as if to imply that she was unsurprised, or maybe that my singlehood was not quite like hers.