Dylan: Hosting a wine tasting at the shop next weekend. Educational event for clients, focusing on historic winemaking regions. Wish you could attend.
Julia smiled.
Julia:Sounds wonderful. I’d come, if Providence weren’t 900 miles away. Boston is a lot closer, though.
Dylan:What is it about you?
Julia:I don’t know what you mean.
Dylan:There’s one more thing I need to know before agreeing to Boston.
Julia:What’s that?
Dylan:Do you have a middle name?
Julia:Celeste.
Dylan:I was hoping for that. Good night, Julia Celeste.
Julia set her phone down, and couldn’t help a big, growing grin. His message hadcome at 10 p.m. She settled in bed, staring at the screen. She was nervous. She was giddy. She was terrified. Boston. She felt the thrill of finally putting a face to his name, to his voice. Their conversations had become a constant in her daily life—morning check-ins, midday anecdotes, evening discussions that often stretched late into the night. There was something uniquely intimate about what they shared. She felt an overwhelming urge to text him back, to say something more. But she resisted. He had taken her by surprise. He wanted to know more about her. She turned off her lamp and fell asleep to a symphony of crickets.
The next morning Julia woke up and checked her phone. But there was nothing from Dylan. That was strange, especially after their agreement to meet in Boston. She sent him a message:
Julia: Hello there—how’s it going in Newport?
She tossed her phone onto the bed. The “Do Not Disturb” reply felt like a splash of water. This wasn’t like Dylan. She got up from the bed and felt strangely unsettled, a gnawing discomfort that stuck to her as morning light crept into her bedroom.
She looked at her reflection in the bathroom mirror. The excitement from the night before was now replaced by a prickly unease. She washed her face and brushed her teeth. She had to get ready for work. In a little while she was dabbing on foundation, then blush, then mascara; her movements automatic. She pulled on a crisp white button-down, then immediately peeled it off. Next, a softer, flowing silk blouse. She settled on a gray knit top that she actually didn’t like, thinking all the while that she had pushed Dylan too far. But what if something had happened to him? This was not like him. But what, exactly, did she know about him to even think that?
The bakery, usually a haven of warmth and the sweet scent of baking, felt different this morning. Julia ordered her usual: a large coffee with cream and sugar, and a blueberry muffin. She sat at a small table by the window and found the light too bright. She felt restless. She grabbed her phone. Still, nothing.
She took a bite of the muffin. The burst of sweet blueberries she loved did little to settle the unease in her stomach. What had happened? A series of rationalizations went through her mind: he forgot his charger, he got swamped, maybe something went wrong at the estate auction—perhaps a rival bidder had turned nasty, or a priceless piece had been damaged. But Dylan wasn’t absent-minded. A forgotten charger? That didn’t feel right. He’d changed his mind about Boston, she concluded. It was too risky. Too much too soon. Too big a commitment.
Since her breakup with Aaron, trust felt like a bruise that would not heal, an ache that flared at unexpected moments. Julia told herself there was no logical reason she should feel so emptied out, so adrift, just for a few hours of missing texts from someone she’d only known online. This wasn’t productive. She sighed, placed the remaining half of the muffin into the paper bag, and headed toward her car with the nagging wonder that something was wrong with her.
The day turned out to be a whirlwind of meetings and back-to-back video calls, each demanding Julia’s full attention. She’d navigated a heated debate with a developer and managed to secure a crucial permit just before the city office closed. Yet, beneath the professional calm, her tension mounted. Her phone lay beside her keyboard like a reproach. Around 3 p.m., as the last meeting ended, she finally gave in. She settled on something simple:“Hey. Hope auctioneer didn’t hijack your phone.”
At a quarter till five, Eliza came into Julia’s office.
“A few of us are going to Riverview for happy hour. Come?”
Julia looked up from her computer. “I have to review the electrical contractor’s proposal tonight.”
Eliza gave her a knowing look. “You mean you have plans to text with Dylan, while pretending to review the proposal.”
“That’s not …” Julia began, then stopped herself.
“When was the last time you came out with the team? Or went out with anyone you could actually see and touch?”
Julia felt a flash of defensiveness. “That’s not fair. You know I’ve been busy with the warehouse project.”
“True. And spending every free minute texting with a man you’ve never met,” Eliza added. “Look, I’m not judging. Just making sure this online thing isn’t a way to avoid …”
“We’re meeting in three weeks,” Julia interrupted.
“And I’m super excited for you,” Eliza said. “Just come have one drink with actual three-dimensional humans tonight, okay? You can text him from the bar if you want.”
Eliza had a point. She had been declining invitations more frequently lately. She preferred the ease of her text conversations with Dylan. And she always felt exhausted after in-person socializing.
