“I know,” she says, “you can imagine what it did for his already gruff exterior. So he broke his collarbone and his dad, you know, being a doctor and all, was ready to take care of him, but then you said you would play Florence Nightingale for him. So he’s lazing on your couch, absolutely banjaxed on painkillers, and then right in the middle of The Notebook, which you were so generously airing for him, he told you he loved you. He said you two were like Noah and Allie and that you ought to be together forever.”

My mouth falls open and then I shut it in a pout. “That’s adorable.”

“Yes, but then he fell asleep about five minutes afterward and slept for fourteen hours. Woke up the next morning without any memory of it.”

“Oh my God.”

“But it was fine, because you told me, and I decided enough was enough after the donkey’s years saga, and I told him what he’d said. You two finally talked, and then you were together for two good years.”

“Two years? That’s a long time.” To someone like me, who has usually freaked out around that time.

“You had wee breakups in between, you’d bicker and then throw the baby out with the bathwater, be apart for a few days, and then go crawling back to him.”

I hate hearing about myself. “And he always took me back?”

“He made you beg sometimes, just to keep a bit of his dignity, but yes. Always. Then around the two-year mark you broke up and it stuck. You freaked out.”

Ah. “Okay … why did I freak out?”

I feel like I could guess.

“Oh, you know.” She pours us more wine. “You were afraid of living some humdrum little life. You didn’t want to become a wife and a mother and then forget you ever had dreams.”

“Huh.”

“Yeah. I mean, I get it. Lots of people don’t want to keep a small life.”

“What about you?” I ask.

“Me? I lead an almost delusionally contented life, me. All the rushing around, hustling and bustling—not for me. I want good wine, good food, and some good sex. Until I tire of sex in my old age, and then I’ll care about some good orthopedic shoes and say endearingly inappropriate things to my young, fit masseuse.”

“Sex right up until the orthopedic shoes, huh? Then no more.”

“No more. I’ll be tired then. Okay, so you broke his heart, and then about six months ago, you got back together. It seemed like things were okay. Great, even. Always the bickering, but in a cute way. And then out of nowhere, it seems, you broke up with him. Again. I don’t think anyone thought it would happen again. Least of all him.”

“Sounds like … I mean it sounds like a mess.”