“Excuse me,” I say to Sheila, “I think my husband might have texted me.”

Ken has not, of course. He leaves for his trips without even waking me up, and he rarely checks in while he’s gone unless it’s to let me know when he’ll be back so I can make sure to have dinner ready and waiting. When he’s home, he’s the perfect, attentive husband and father. Affectionate, slightly stern, full of advice. Right out of a sitcom. When he’s gone, I might as well be single.

They call us to get seated for dinner, and it turns out that the singles are all at the same table. Me, Beth, Lisa … and Christian Campbell.

Relief floods me with the force of a river after a torrential rain and threatens to wash me away. He sees it in my eyes and smiles that slow and knowing grin again, the one that always made me hate and love him at the same time. How could I ever have thought that seeing him again wouldn’t send me reeling?

“Hello again,” he says as he pulls out a chair for me. He gives Beth and Lisa each an equally flirtatious look. “I guess I’m the lucky guy tonight, huh?”

“You’re cheesy,” Beth says, but fondly.

There’s something between the two of them they think nobody else will see. I understand that, because that’s how it had been with me and him, back in the days of black eyeliner and the back seat of his mother’s Buick. Lisa sees it too. My heart gets tight, beating faster as though it’s fighting hard against the squeeze of a fist.

“I thought you left,” I say.

Christian slides into the chair next to mine. “Were you worried?”

“Of course not,” I tell him, but he knows I’m lying again.

During dinner, Christian’s knee bumps mine too often to be an accident. Somehow, he manages to get a few bottles of wine for the table so we can keep refilling our glasses without going up to the bar. He regales us with gross stories about med school, making Beth squeal with a disgust that sounds fake.

“So, you never got married?” Lisa asks shrewdly as she holds up her glass for him to fill.

Christian shrugs. “Nope. Dating in med school’s too hard, much less trying to have a family. I figure I’ll wait until I make it through my residency, get my practice going. Then I’ll settle down.”

“You’ll be an old dad,” Beth says.

“Maybe I’ll marry someone who already has kids. Ready-made,” Christian tells her smoothly. “Get myself a sugar mama.”

“If you’re going to be a plastic surgeon, why would you need a sugar mama?” Lisa asks with a laugh.

“Because med school is expensive,” he replies.

They think he’s making jokes, but I hear truth in his voice. When he turns toward me, his gaze sweeps over my face. He touches the pendant necklace nestled in the hollow of my throat, but so fast I don’t even have time to pull away before he’s turned his attention back to Lisa and Beth.