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“Kate!” Jo growls.
“Okay, okay. I’ll stop being bad,” she says, rolling her eyes.
I blink at her, grinning. “Oh, please don’t,” I say, and she grins back at me, eyes locking with mine.Fuck.She clears her throat and turns to where Jo is standing by the stovetop, breaking the spell.
“What can I do, Jo?” she says, eyes flickering over the pans.
Janus is still scrolling on his phone, and I ease forward to stand beside her, placing my glass of wine on the countertop. Jo hands us serving dishes full of vegetables, gesturing at the pale wooden table and dangling lights beyond the island. Side lamps illuminate the comfy couches and thick rugs, and outside the windows that run along the far wall, Manhattan twinkles at me invitingly. By the time everything is laid out and we sink into our seats, Janus has managed to dig up another fact.
“Okay, here it is,” he says. “In a magazine survey, given the choice, 75 percent of readers said they would prefer to sleep with one man in their lifetime rather than have sex with a hundred men.”
“No surprise,” says Jo. “Who’d want to put up with a hundred guys’ egos? Jesus.”
“I’m definitely a one-woman guy,” I say, holding up a hand, and Kate’s eyes snap to me. She’s surprised? Surely most people want to find that significant person. I can’t resist teasing a little, though. “Imagine all the shit you’d have to take from that many women, all that jabbering.”
Janus glances at me. “Yeah, even talking to one woman … you know, having to act like you’re listening when you’re really not.”
I link my hands behind my head and lean back into my chair. “The tuning out while still nodding your head is a real skill,” I say, taking the ball and running with it.
“All the talk about shopping,” he says, looking at the ceiling.
“All the advice about tech,” Jo murmurs, handing a well-stacked plate over to me. I inhale the most delicious beef stew I’ve ever smelt, and my stomach growls.
I catch Kate’s grin as she dips her head. “Oh yes! The having to act like the size of their penis is okay to protect their egos, the pretending they’re good in bed.”
“Just a minute,” I say, “the pretending …?”
“Oh yeah,” says Jo, interrupting me. “Faking orgasm.”
This is too much for Janus. He puts his cutlery down and turns to frown at her. “You have never faked it with me.” He states this categorically, and my mouth curls up.
She laughs, wrinkling her nose at him. “That would be telling,” she says with a wink, and he pins her with a stare, jaw tight. There are going to be words behind closed doors later. Honestly, I love these two, they’re so cute, and, as I shift my eyes away from them, I catch Kate studying me. Her eyes drop down to the plate in front of her, and I try and tamp down the answering vibration in my body.
“Guys,” I say, holding up my hands, “too much talk about sex.”
“Is there even such a thing?” Jo says, lifting a forkful to her mouth.
Kate shakes her head and smiles. “I think the men are feeling threatened,” and she reaches out and pats my arm over the table.
And in this moment, I know I’m royally fucked. I really like this woman, and there’s no way on earth I’m good enough for her.
4
Kate
Heads lift up around me as I pull out the chair and it scrapes across the gleaming floor of the McNally Jackson Café, and Jo looks up from her phone. Jo and I became friends as freshmen at NYU, along with Liss, who I shared a dorm with. We adopted Jo because she lived next door and had a terrible roommate, and I think she ended up hanging out in our room more than we did. Jo now lives in Brooklyn, and I’m still in the same apartment Liss and I shared in sophomore year. Liss intermittently shares it with me, but she’s been away in Africa since January. Jo’s built a company out of helping people out at college, and I’m slightly envious, but it’s a good envy. And I know things always look easier from the outside: She gripes about how hard it is doing her own thing, and I tell her how stressful it is in medicine.
She puts down her phone and taps my hand. “Before we talk about other things,” she says as I sink into a seat opposite her. “I want to find out what’s happened about that email?”
After I’d eaten a ton of ice cream, I sent Mike’s email on to her and later cried on her shoulder.
“Okay, okay, Mom,” I say. “I talked to Mike. He was very supportive, but a few people have passed on to him that I’m below proficiency, he didn’t say who. One of the attendings then took me through case by case where I’d not done what was expected. That was really hard to hear … He said I lacked confidence and didn’t ask enough questions or ask for help when I needed it.” I blow out a long breath.
“Oh God, Kate, that sounds shit.”
“I’ve always done okay at school and on my previous rotations. What he said was just so negative. It’s the first time in my life I’ve failed so badly.”
“I’m sure you’re not doing badly,” she says, stoutly. “What do they do in situations like this?”
