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off to a fancy firm job in New York, where he met his girlfriend, Sarah; he followed her to Atlanta when she won a coveted promotion; that was where they got engaged.
    And somehow, Bea still couldn’t believe any of it, as if the last eight years of her life had existed in some kind of stasis. Three years of knowing Ray, dreaming of Ray, yearning for Ray, believing with all her heart that he must feel the same. One night of blissful, agonizing confirmation. Five years of wondering whether any of it had been real.
    She’d dated other men in the intervening time, of course, but she never found that same spark—no one so movie-star handsome, so quietly funny, so utterly captivating. Of all the app dates and setups, no one else had that thick, dark hair and those smoldering Brando eyes; no one else could run a finger along her arm and make her entire body feel weak.
    And anyway, Bea’s primary focus was on other aspects of her life—career, friends, travel, family—she didn’t mind waiting to find another love as passionate and exciting as what she’d felt for Ray. She was sure one would come eventually. And in the meantime … well, in the meantime … was it really so bad to live in her memories? Her fantasies?
    But today wasn’t a memory or a fantasy: Ray was on a plane right now, probably somewhere over the Midwest, hurtling toward Los Angeles, where he was spending one night in Bea’s guest room before catching a train to San Diego the next morning for some kind of anniversary weekend for his fiancée’s parents. Bea and Ray hadn’t seen each other for more than a year, not since a stilted meet-up in a crowded bar (with Sarah in tow, no less) during one of Bea’s whirlwind trips for New York Fashion Week. It had been loud, Bea had been exhausted, Ray had been sour. But tonight could be different—just the two of them, no noise. A chance to rekindle the connection Bea so desperately missed.
    “No.” Bea shook her head when Paul produced one of her typical bottles, a crisp twelve-dollar white. “For tonight, I need something special.”
    Three hours later, Bea paced the wide, uneven floorboards of her bungalow in Elysian Heights, a rickety little rental perched precariously on a hillside overlooking Elysian Park. The place was filled with creaks and cracks where faucets were rusty and doors weren’t cut quite long enough, but Bea loved it all the more for that; she vastly preferred a homey, colorful aesthetic to anything too modern or tidy—which, to her eye, lacked character.
    Now, though, with Ray in a cab just minutes away, she began to see her home through his eyes: not artful but ragged, not welcoming but pitiful. She smoothed down the full skirt of her black corseted sundress (affectionately nicknamed her “slutty goth milkmaid ensemble” because of the off-the-shoulder neckline that showed off her cleavage in Oktoberfest proportion) and wondered if he’d see her the same way.
    “This is idiotic,” Bea muttered, stopping in front of her hall mirror to tousle her meticulously mussed waves one more time, her hair nearly as dark as the perfectly smudged kohl eyeliner that rendered her bright blue eyes electric. She sucked in a breath: He was just her friend, just Ray, just visiting. Him coming here didn’t mean anything—just as their kiss, their whole history, all of it, probably never had. It was all in her head, as usual.
    Except the second she opened the door and he threw his arms around her, she knew that she was wrong.
    “Bea.” He exhaled, dropping his bag on the floor with a thwack so he could fully encircle her with both arms, hugging her tightly against him.
    “Hiya, stranger.” Bea beamed up at him, and God he looked the same, straight nose and soft lips and those eyes that drank in every inch of her, his hungry gaze that always made her face flush with heat.
    “I missed you.” He gave her a little squeeze, leaning down to kiss her temple gently.
    “I’ve been here this whole