Carmen and I have had a standing happy hour date every Thursday since we got fake IDs our freshman year at NYU nearly a decade ago. At first, we went to Sigma Burger Pie, the frat-themed dive bar behind the library that miraculously let you pay for PBRs using Campus Cash. When the police shut it down after less than a semester, we migrated to Crocodile Lounge, where beers cost $4 and every round got you a free personal-sized pizza. After graduation, we traded up; these days, we mostly hang out at wine bars and don’t flinch at the cost of the cheese plates. So it doesn’t matter that today has been a beast of a day—today is Thursday. It’s time for happy hour. It’s tradition.

It’s her turn to choose the spot, so I trek up to the Upper East Side to meet her at AOC East, the French wine bar. We’ve never been here before, but that’s typical. Carmen doesn’t have regular spots; she gets bored too quickly. It’s out of the way for both of us, but she swears the wine list is worth it.

When I arrive at AOC East, I feel transported to Paris. The walls are musty brick and cranberry paint, stacked with bookshelves filled with classic editions and landscape paintings in gilded frames. A French flag hangs proudly on one wall and the ceilings drip with dainty string lights. The low chatter from other tables is all in French. It’s not hard to spot Carmen at a table by the window. She’s resplendent in a pink jumpsuit, white sneakers, and gold hoop earrings. Last year, she made the switch from doing marketing at old-school giant L’Oréal to the relatively newer Tinder, and she’s been reveling in the lax dress code ever since. She wears magenta lipstick and sips a glass of what must be French rosé (the only kind she has determined worthy of drinking) carefully. Her eyebrows shoot up when she sees me.

“Hi! Okay, gimme all the deets,” she commands.

We’d been texting about everything that happened since this morning, but it’s different in person. Here, she can fake gagging noises when I tell her about Holden commenting on my Instagram, and she can slip the ring off my finger to try it on herself. The waiter comes by to drop off a glass of French rosé that matches hers; it’s part of our tradition to order for each other if we’re running late so we never miss the happy hour special.

“So, if you’re faking an engagement, don’t you need . . . a fiancé?” she asks.

“I have a plan!” I explain. “What if I pretend that I’m madly in love but he has a super-private job and can’t appear on any social media?”

“Like that consultant you dated once,” she recalls.