Hannah had even cleaned Rob’s apartment once, on the weekend when he had the flu and couldn’t get out of bed. She was on her hands and knees in his bathroom, swearing that unless she killed the germs he’d get sick all over again.

He never returned those favors. In fact, it was he who had driven her Ford Tempo into a pole on her twentieth birthday, shortly after calling her predictable for wanting to go home early. He later argued, to their mutual friends, that Hannah should never have let him drive after four beers and that allowing him to do so was also predictable.

He’d never asked her about her family, never made it comfortable for her to talk about her feelings, even when he knew she was desperate to share.

In Rob’s mind Hannah had always expected too much of him and had set herself up to be irrationally disappointed when he behaved like himself. It was unfair. Rob had never pretended to be anything he wasn’t. Even now he was just a guy who sent nice e-mails and said funny things on the phone. He wasn’t a guy who actually showed up for her when it mattered.

When Rob first received the “save the date” card for Bee’s wedding—the one that showed Bee and her husband-to-be standing in an apple orchard—he was actually charmed. It was the closest he’d ever come to being a proud parent.

In the picture Bee wore a puffy vest over a long-sleeved T-shirt and jeans. She looked blonder than he remembered and even prettier. Her cheeks were rosy and her smile was genuine. She looked confident. It was a Bee he’d never seen.

Behind her, with his arms around her waist, was Matt Fee, the lucky guy. Rob had heard from Hannah in an e-mail that Matt was a lawyer, but in this picture he looked more like a football star. He had wavy hair that was just a shade or two darker than Bee’s and arms that were about three times the width of Rob’s.

The picture showed Bee and Matt posed behind two bushels of apples. The text over the image said, “We’ve picked each other!”

Rob would have expected an apple-picking pun on a “save the date” postcard to make him angry or at the very least annoyed, but, much to his surprise, the card pleased him. Bee deserved this. She was introverted and kind, and she should have someone who’d treat her well. She’d had a rough go of finding a partner in college, no thanks to her long-term crush on him and her tendency to be Hannah’s quiet sidekick.

Bee was beautiful, but most of the young men at school treated her like a purebred dog. She seemed too wholesome and refined to play with. And it was clear, whether Bee wanted it to be or not, that dating her meant marrying her, or at the very least being true to her. Most men in college weren’t ready for that responsibility. Rob wasn’t surprised that it wasn’t until law school that Bee found a man who, like Matt, was ready to be loyal.