I put a finger to my lips. “Nora, not so loud.”
“Speaking of,” Nora said, turning to me. “What am I thinking? You had your date with Gunnar on Saturday. How was it?”
I sighed. “It wasn’t good.”
“Oh no. Do you want to tell us about it?” Nora asked. “I mean, obviously you have to; I’m just trying to be nice.”
After a string of bad first dates, I’d been ready to side with Hazel and give up on dating. Or at least take a good, long break. But Nora had offered to pick my next date. Her theory was that we could outsmart my bad dating luck by having someone else choose who I went out with.
She’d found Gunnar, a guy she deemed Everly-date-worthy, on a dating app. I’d messaged him, hoping her theory was right.
Her theory had been wrong. Very, very wrong.
“First of all, I thought we were going to lunch, but he took me to a wedding.”
“On your first date?” Hazel asked.
“Yes, and he was a groomsman,” I said. “He didn’t tell me until we were in the car, already on the way. He had some excuse about thinking the wedding was next weekend and he didn’t want to break our date. I should have gone home right then. But I thought maybe an unconventional first date was a good sign.”
“That’s fair logic,” Hazel said.
“You’d think. It was two hours away, at a winery in the mountains. The wedding itself wasn’t terrible, but as soon as we got to the reception, everyone started guzzling tequila like they were at a club in Mexico over spring break. I wound up on the dance floor among a bunch of drunk people twerking. A bridesmaid rubbed her boobs all over me like a stripper giving a standing lap dance, and then a cake fight broke out. I barely made it out of there alive. And that’s still not the worst part.”
“What could be worse than all that?” Hazel asked.
I shuddered, the memory of my awful Saturday burned into my brain. “Oh my god, I don’t know if I want to tell you.”
“Come on, sweetie,” Nora said. “Circle of trust.”
Nora clasped hands with Hazel on one side, then offered me her other hand while Hazel did the same.
I took both their hands, forming our sacred circle of trust. “Okay. I went outside to figure out what to do, and Gunnar came out with one of the drunk bridesmaids. She was hanging all over him, basically humping his leg.”
“Oh god,” Nora said.
“So then he invited me to come with them to the hotel next door for a threesome. He said he had enough for both of us, and then she made some very graphic comments about what she’d do to me, if I was willing to do the same to her.”
“She said she’d eat you out if you ate her out, didn’t she?” Nora asked, completely nonchalant.
I rolled my eyes. “Yes, but did you need to say it out loud?”
“I was just clarifying.”
“Obviously I said no. I took a picture of him with the drunk bridesmaid and texted it to him so he’d see it when he sobered up, and told him it was why I was blocking his number.”
“Good,” Hazel said.
Nora let go of my hand and held hers out. “I need to see this.”
I got out my phone and showed her the photo. The lighting wasn’t great, but it showed a disheveled, cake-smeared Gunnar, with a woman in an ugly peach bridesmaid dress groping him on the front porch of the winery.
“Wow,” Nora said, holding the phone by her fingertips, as if the photo itself would soil her. “That’s horrible.”
“It was exactly as bad as it sounds. Even I can’t sugar coat it. I was stuck at a stranger’s wedding two hours from home where basically everyone was drunk. My date ditched me because I wouldn’t go to a hotel for a threesome. And I didn’t even get any cake because they ruined it with the food fight.”
“Honey, I am so sorry.” Nora put my phone down and squeezed my hand. “This is all my fault.”
“No, it’s not. I know he was your pick, but it was just a guy on a dating app. It’s not like you could have known.”
“How did you get home?” Hazel asked.
“Oh, well, that’s the good part, actually. I met the family that owns the winery. They’re the sweetest people. They offered me a guest cottage for the night and I ended up having dinner with them. I would have called one of you to come get me, but they insisted on driving me home yesterday. And before you freak out because I’d just met them, they’re all married adults and most of them have kids. I drove back yesterday with two of the couples. Honestly, they were all so great, it was hard to say goodbye.”
“I’m glad for that, at least,” Hazel said.
“Can I have that photo?” Nora asked.
“Why?”
“Because I want to plaster it all over social media.”
I snatched my phone off the table. “No.”
“Come on, Everly. I hate him for what he did to you, and it’s my fault because I chose him. I still don’t know how my instincts were so off.”
“I don’t think it’s you, I think it’s me,” I said. “We tried to fool my bad luck and it didn’t work. I’m cursed.”
“There’s really no such thing as luck,” Hazel said. “Or curses.”
“Disagree,” Nora said. She tossed back the rest of her drink and waved her empty glass at Jake for another, tapping mine with her other hand. “Everly does have terrible luck with men.”
“Luck has no basis in reality,” Hazel said. “You can’t predict or prove its existence.”
“Exhibit A, Gunnar,” Nora said. “I don’t even need to explain how he proves my point.”
“I agree, that was bad,” Hazel said.
“Exhibit B, the guy who interviewed her, including questions about her medical history to determine whether she could deliver healthy babies. And his mom showed up to review his notes.”
I winced. “Jerry. Yeah, that was pretty bad.”
“Exhibit C, the gay guy who’d been through a recent break-up and was trying to get out of a rut by taking a woman on a date.”
“To be fair, that was his friend’s idea,” I said. “And despite not being compatible, we had a nice time.”
“I don’t think additional evidence is needed,” Nora said. “Although I could go on and on. Do you remember Nick from a few years ago?”
I groaned.
“She dated him for a few months until she found out he was dealing stolen prescription narcotics.”
Jake brought a fresh round of drinks and I took a long swallow of mine. “That police raid was so stressful.”
“See? Bad luck,” Nora said. “Terrible, actually. It’s not like you could have predicted any of it. We all have things we watch out for in men, but no one has their radar tuned to the kinds of men you seem to attract.”
“There’s something wrong with me,” I said. “Do I have a sign on my back that says desperate?”
“Of course not,” Nora said. “That’s what I mean about bad luck. It’s not your fault.”
“I guess not,” I said. “But look at me. I’m thirty years old and still single. I might as well get a cat.”