“Fine. Five couples, five years. We each get a point for every couple we’re right about.”
“Deal,” he says.
“Since I clearly have the advantage, you can pick the first couple.”
He taps his lip, thinking.
“Marian and Marcus.”
“What’s your prediction?”
He laughs. “Are you kidding? They’re obviously in love. They have been since we were teenagers, and the way they were dancing last night—I think they finally know it. I think that when we see them again in five years they’ll be married with kids.”
I don’t buy it. Nostalgia for a high school relationship is not the same thing as compatibility. See: us. Seth is mistaking the second-chance romance trope for a real rekindled relationship.
“Nah,” I say. “At best, they might date long-distance for a minute, but they won’t end up together. She needs someone with a bigger personality. Besides, Marian is a planner. If marrying Marcus were part of her plan, she would have done it already.”
Seth pulls out his phone and starts typing. “Marcus and Marian,” he murmurs. “Rubenstein for, Marks against.” He looks up at me. “Your turn to pick.”
I go for one I know I’m right about. “Dezzie and Rob. They’ll still be together. Those two are going to die an hour apart in the same bed when they’re ninety-nine, squabbling after making passionate love.”
Something dark flashes over his face. “I’m not sure about that.”
“What? You’re the one who believes in true love. Even my calcified heart can see that if anyone has it, it’s them.”
He winces. “Don’t get me wrong—they’re both lovely people. I just got a strange vibe from Rob. He was drunkenly flirting with everyone in the room last night. Actually, now that I think about it, so was she.”
“That’s just what they’re like,” I protest. “It’s like a game to them.”
He shrugs. “Sometimes games wear thin. Opposites attract, and they seem so similar they might combust.”
I’m offended on behalf of my friends.
“They most certainly will not. Opposites attract is a tired old romancetrope. In real life, people are drawn to human beings like themselves. Have you ever noticed how longtime couples begin to look alike?”
He literally guffaws. “Yep. And Dezzie and Rob look nothing alike. Did you see what they were wearing? My God.”
Before I can point out that they are still in their early thirties and have plenty of time to age into one another’s clones, he’s tapping his phone.
“Anyway, that’s two,” he says. “My pick. I’m going for Alyssa and Ryland.”
This one feels easy as well. “They stay together,” I say. It would be unsporting of me to predict that my friend’s relationship will fall apart, but in this case I really, truly believe that Alyssa and Ryland will outlast us all.
Seth raises his brows at me. “You’re awfully optimistic for someone who purportedly believes that love is a mass delusion.”
I shrug. “I didn’t say itcan’texist. I just don’t think it’s fated. And most of the time, it doesn’t last.”
He takes a sip of his green juice. “I think you’re less cynical than you think you are.”
“I think you don’t know much about me.”
“I think I know alotabout you.”
“Because we dated fifteen years ago?”
“Yes. You still have the same world-weary affect protecting a vulnerable emotional core.”
“Nope,” I say, snatching a piece of bacon off his plate. “My emotional core is dead. Anyway, Alyssa and Ryland. What’s your prediction?”
