The True Love Experiment

Now might be the time to admit that I was once one of those people, or quietly contemplate the connection we share between our respective careers versus what our parents think we should be doing. But my first thought flies out instead. “I think you are the masterpiece.”

She opens her mouth as if she’s got a smart comeback, but nothing happens. With a wry twist to her lips, she shakes her head at me. “You’re something else.”

“Something good, I hope.”

She points to the seats. “Groom’s side on the left. That’s where you’ll sit. Go make friends.”

“Got it.”

“I’ll see you after the ceremony.” She gathers her dress and turns to head back inside to meet the wedding party. “Miss me,” she calls over her shoulder.

I watch her walk away, quietly admitting, “I already do.”





thirty-three FIZZY




I have been to an inordinate number of weddings in my day. I have been maid of honor twice (Alice and Jess), a bridesmaid fourteen times, performed three weddings, and twice have done a reading during the ceremony (once was a passage from one of my books, and that was very weird). I’m sure a lot of people go to weddings and take note of what they like, what they would do differently. They think about the decor and the food and the number of guests. They lean in and whisper that they would never have put so-and-so and what’s-her-name at the same table. They maybe even get business cards from the various vendors.

Not me. It’s possible that the shine has been scrubbed off weddings in all my various experiences with them, but I think the wedding is the least romantic part of romance. Sure, there is splendor and catering and the opportunity to wear completely outlandish clothing. But there is also family politics and stress and the reality that many people spend the equivalent of a down payment on a house on a single day’s celebration. Love is not found in a four-foot-high floral centerpiece or a seven-tiered chocolate cake. Real romance is in the quieter details. Who proposes, and how. The way they look at each other across a room. The anticipation of what it means to be married, the nights spent side by side, shaping their forever. The first moment alone after the commitment is made. The day after, when they get to finally embark on the adventure. And, of course, all the banging.

But these are things one never considers about one’s brother. Yuck.

I blink away from Peter and over to his new wife, Kailey, just as she’s kissed by a grown-up version of the person who more than once held me down and farted on my face.

He pulls away, smiling, and there—right there—is what I came here to see: that unadulterated look of awe. That first beat of eye contact, the silently squealed We’re really married? Peter can be a selfish ass and I will never forgive him for cutting my ponytail off when I was thirteen, but he loves Kailey. He’ll be good to her.

And hopefully he will knock her up soon and keep the focus off me and my continued single status. That is, I remind myself, unless I end up happily ever after with one of my Heroes.

The thought pings around in my mind, but it remains a tennis ball bouncing on empty walls. I look out to the cheering crowd of guests, my eyes zeroing in on Connor in the middle of the pack, standing like a skyscraper in the suburbs. And what do you know? He’s looking right back at me.



* * *



It takes ten minutes to make my way through the crowd to him, and in between catching up with family, being stopped for photos, and once directing someone to the closest restroom, I’m able to catch glimpses of him talking to people around him. God, I love that I can find him so easily, that he cleans up so well in a slim-fitting black tux, and that he left his hair soft and floppy instead of meticulously styled. But his looks aren’t even the most interesting thing about him anymore. He’s so personally warm, gives such sincere eye contact. I love the way he interacted with my mom, the way he was so excited to meet everyone who stopped us on our way out to the garden. The way he puts his whole self into whatever he does and lets himself be emotional when he talks about his daughter. Connor Prince III should be awarded a gold medal in the Active Listening event at the Romance Olympics. It’s hard to believe I looked at him months ago and saw a plastic hero archetype. He’s no longer Hot Millionaire Executive or Hot Brit or Soft Lumberjack or even DILF… he’s just Connor.

How did I once find him boring and unpleasant and cliché? Now I’m struggling to not think of him as soulmate material.

And it’s good that I’m succeeding, because by the time I reach him, he’s standing with one of Peter’s high school friends, a petite blonde named—I kid you not—Ashley Simpson. When I say Ashley is hanging on Connor’s arm, I mean this: imagine a giant rock, and then imagine a barnacle. I like Ashley well enough—even though she toyed with Peter’s heart for years when he believed looks were more important than brains, and then chased him relentlessly once he figured out that brains were more important than looks—but I step up behind them right as she asks Connor if she can steal him away for the first dance, and my gut fills with a shimmering, violent heat.

I jerk to a stop. He hasn’t seen me. He should accept. I won’t like it, but it would be a good way out of this weird, inappropriate, untenable thing we have going on. I’m supposed to like Isaac or Dax or Nick. (Maybe Jude. I think we can all agree Evan isn’t it. But Connor is definitely not it.)

But then Connor says only a gentle “Sorry, tonight these dancing feet belong to Fizzy,” and my heart takes a gasping, free-falling tumble into my stomach.

At Jess’s bachelorette party, we were doing the drunk yet predictable swoon over all the big and small ways River is perfect for her. Given that everyone else was married, inevitably the topic turned to me, and the disaster of my love affair with Rob. The group was small—only about six of us—but everyone fell into overlapping reassurance that I’m amazing, that I deserve the best man alive, that whoever this magical human is, he’s still out there for me.

I didn’t believe it at the time, and despite doing this show, I’m not sure I totally believe it now. In the past couple of decades, I’ve dated a lot. I always assumed I wasn’t picky; I liked to brag that I didn’t have a type. I’ve had a thousand awesome first dates, and a handful of fun second dates. And then, that’s it. I’m attracted to a lot of people, but rarely do emotions get involved. In hindsight, my feelings for Rob benefitted from standing in the residual glow of Jess and River. But truthfully, the relationship was embarrassingly superficial. I didn’t know anything about his life (obviously), and he certainly never made me feel like this.

Oh shit, that’s not bad. I open my clutch for my notebook but come up empty. Even if I had started carrying one consistently again, this clutch is the size of a Pop-Tart.

Standing behind Connor, watching him gently but firmly turn down an objectively gorgeous woman, knowing that he does not do casual relationships and that he understands and admires me enough to put his entire professional career in my hands, and that if he feels even a fraction for me of what I feel for him, he’s putting his heart on the line to do this show with me, I realize that what I told him weeks ago is true, I don’t have a type.

But maybe I do actually have a one.

Have you ever been slapped? By yourself? This feels a little like that. I close my eyes, really squeeze them shut, willing the panic to subside. If I were writing this moment, I would describe the tunneling awareness that the feelings I’ve been ignoring have been here all along. I’d maybe make the heroine stagger to the side or reach for a half-empty glass of champagne and down it to take the edge off the sudden appearance of dizzying anxiety. But in reality, epiphanies just feel like your soul opening a gaping mouth and lamenting, “Oh, I am such a dumbass.”