Thank you to the sensitivity readers who put in emotional work to help me tell this story in the most thoughtful way possible. Esther Kim and Ellie Mae McGregor, your insightful perspectives meant the world to me. Any oversights are my errors alone.

Thank you to my sister, Heather, for reading this book so many times and always offering to read it more. Thank you to Meredith Ryan, for allowing me to borrow your name, and your career, and your amazing hair for the best friend character in this book, and thank you for always being the Aries to my Pisces. Thank you to Michelle Agne, whose name I didn’t use, but who can be found in the best parts of every character I write. Not to be weird, but you’re the person I want to be when I grow up. The three of you make up my heart, and I couldn’t write about love and joy without you. Thank you for sticking beside me through all my seasons of needing.

Thank you to Andie Sheridan, for giving me the title of this book, and for giving me so much of your time and energy. Thank you for all the emails and Google Docs and brainstorms it took to unlock Jack’s character.

Thank you to Jordan, who took on so much during the line edits of this book (aka the hardest four weeks of my life). Thank you for feeding me and cleaning the house and taking care of the dogs while I cried in front of my computer screen. It seems only fitting that I met you while revising this book; you’re worth every risk.

Thank you to the rest of my family—Erin, Mark, Bill, Kim, Brooklyn, and John—who celebrate every victory, no matter how small. Thank you to my grandma, Laverne O’Reilly, who passed away in January 2022, and who influenced so much of who I am today.

Thank you to my Portland friends—Leanna, Sarah, Hayley, Bryan C., Jill, Bryan B., and Julianne—who are so supportive and so very generous with their preorders. Thank you to Nicky, Tiana, Tiffany, Jill, and literally anyone who has ever sent me a photo of The Charm Offensive in an airport bookstore.

Thank you to Portland itself, for being a weird little city where so many queer people feel at home. If you’re not from here—it’s not as awful as they make it out to be on the news, I promise. But Portland, like so many cities in the US, is struggling with a major housing crisis that has only been exacerbated by the pandemic, leaving many of our neighbors housing-insecure. If you’re interested in learning more about how to support the unhoused population in Portland, you can check out resources on my website www.alisoncochrun.com.