But, after all this, they were still together two months later. When Ina first unloaded all this drama on me over Ice Blendeds at the Coffee Bean on Larchmont, I’d known to mask my true feelings. I had been down this road before with other friends. When someone told you some horrible story about her boyfriend, you never let her know that you’d always thought the guy was a jerk and it was a huge relief to finally be able to come clean about that time he’d once called you when she was out of town. Saying such a thing was always a mistake, because more often than not they worked it out and went back to pawing each other in front of you and sucking faces.

“Hey,” Ina said brightly as she sat down.

“Hey,” I answered lifelessly. “I already ordered a salad for us to split.”

“That sounds yummy. What happened? You look like you ran into a truck face-first.”

“Thanks,” I replied, trying to smile. “I kind of did.” I was trying to maintain my composure, but I could feel my face crumple up so I knew the ugly-face cry was coming. I told her about the receipt and the Yellow Alert.

“You’re never gonna trust him,” Ina said. “He’s a dog. He’s always checking out girls when he thinks you’re not looking.”

“All guys check out girls—it’s how guys are,” I shot back. “I just don’t know—I’m afraid to confront him because I don’t want him to know I was going through his stuff.”

Ina stared me down. “Look, you’ve got two choices. You can call him on it or let it go. There could be a lot of explanations for the receipt—maybe something came up last minute and he knew you’d be mad if you knew he changed his plans to accommodate someone while bailing on you. Which is fucked-up in its own way . . .” She perked up even more. “Maybe he was secretly meeting with a jewelry designer to make a ring for you! Maybe this is all about something great for you and you won’t want to blow it by ragging on him!”

That was a bit of a stretch even for me. I was so depressed. I realized I was not in the mood to hear any more of Ina’s Dave theories, so I changed the subject. “Hey, how’s Larry? Still married?”

Ina was suddenly distracted, asking the busboy for more iced tea. “Yes, he’s still married, but only because that bitch won’t give him a divorce.”

“I don’t get that. If this marriage was some spur-of-the-moment thing in Vegas, like he says it was, why does she want to hang onto a guy like Larry?”

Ina narrowed her eyes. “What do you mean, a guy like Larry?”