My compromise is a noodle-armed pat. “You’re very needy tonight.”

Once Toni’s done squeezing the pulp out of me, Jules hands me a brimming glass of white wine. “You’ll have to wait and watch Keira Knightley cry on your own time,” she says. “Happy endings only. I can’t take the heartbreak.”

“You know what I hate?” Sula says as Margo plops onto the sofa next to her, snack mix in hand. “I hate those movies that get you thinking you’re in for a romance. That make you feel all happy inside, give you hot sex, great character development, all the emotions, and then—boom—they don’t end up together.”

“Or one of them dies,” Toni says darkly. “Those are not romances.”

“They aren’t?” I ask.

The whole room tells me, “No!”

“Okay,” I mutter, tail between my legs as I settle into an armchair. “Just asking.”

“You read romance,” Margo says. “How do you not know this?”

“I guess I never noticed that they always end up together.”

Jules sighs. “I loan her my beloved historical romance novels, and this is how she repays me. She doesn’t even grasp the best part of the genre: happily ever after.”

Sipping my wine, I shrug. “I’m in it for the fucking and the fancy talk.”

“Fair, but let us be clear,” Toni says. “ ‘Romance’ means happy endings. ‘Love story’ means they took a romance novel, cut out the back ten percent, and replaced it with misery.”

“Preach.” Sula knocks his wineglass in cheers. “I’m Team Romance. Otherwise, I’d rather watch something grim from minute one. It’s awful starting happy and ending sad.”

“Same.” Jules grabs the remote and turns on the movie, then has a sip of her wine. “There’s nothing worse than thinking you’re in for a romance, getting invested in a couple’s happiness, then watching outside forces tear it apart, or worse—watching two people in love destroy it themselves.”

As their words seep in, I freeze with my wine halfway to my mouth. That’s my solution to . . . everything. Not just getting the best revenge but solving the Jamie Paradox.

The root of my problem in the Jamie Paradox is that there’s nothing disingenuous between us, no act, no script. Having tentatively agreed not to assume the worst in each other, we’re now winging it gently, careful of each other while figuring out how to be friends. I’m not sure how far our behavior—beyond those kisses—is going to go in convincing the group we’re falling in love. It’s definitely not going to help me keep my feelings in check, either.