Andy says that I sound pissed. And I guess I am. I’d wanted some time to myself, to clear my head. But there we were, attached at the hip, as always. It’s such a shitty, ungenerous thought to have so I tell myself it’s the pot talking.

“Some couples like that togetherness-thing,” she says. “You must like it, on some level, if you ended up here together.” I shrug, and then she shrugs, and then she says she’s not interested in any of that straight-cis-married-shit. “I’m single. By choice.”

“You’re smart.”

“I know.”

“You have no idea.”

“I do.”

“You should stay that way.”

“I will.”

* * *

In minutes, after she leaves, I feel awful for being so unkind about Gary’s breakthrough, especially since I only want him to do well, to thrive, to conquer his anxiety. I just wish that we both had it easier. I often wonder, as I do right now, if I’d known how much Gary and his anxiety might eclipse me—that being in his orbit might pull me away from my work, my thoughts, my own private world, the dissociated place in my head I’d always gone to that made it possible for me to think and work—whether I still would have married him. I think back often to the beginning, to when Gary and I first met, as if there is an answer I will find there. If I’d known how hard things would be now, would I have made the same choice? Would he? Doesn’t every married person ask themselves this question?

Sometimes, when I’m with Glenn, waiting for a doctor to see her or for a drip to start, and I tell her the latest with Gary—a new anxiety trigger or symptom, the possibility of an untried therapy, even more pot—she shakes her head.

“I told you,” she says. “But you didn’t listen. And now you’re stuck.”

She means “stuck” in the best possible way, though. She means: stuck together, like birds of a feather. She means: “You’re not just married. You’re family now. Because that’s what happens.”

That is what’s happened. It’s why we stay. I look away from whatever nurse or needle is closing in on her, out a window if there is one, at the patterns on floor and ceiling tiles, and think back to the early days, when I first met Gary. He’s temping in the publicity and marketing departments of Black Bear Books, coming and going for weeks at a time, during our busy periods—opening boxes, packing up Jiffy bags, collating binders for sales meetings, organizing shipments for trade shows. I notice him—who didn’t?—because he’s tall and funny and straight—a unicorn in New York publishing.

“I love the guy, but no,” Glenn says when I ask about him.

“I don’t care that he’s still a temp at his age.”

“I don’t care either. I meant that he’s too complicated.”

“Everyone still single is ‘too complicated.’ That’s why we’re still single.” I roll my eyes for good measure, but in truth I’m concerned. Glenn’s warning reminds me of the time a friend wanted to fix me up with someone she’d met at a wedding. “You should meet him,” she said, “but he has glasses.” I stared at her. “How big are the glasses?” The friend had cleared her throat. “Very, very big.” Which they were, when I finally met him because I didn’t believe her. I’m not sure I believe Glenn now, either, even though I know I probably should. “How complicated?”