But presumably someone out there must be happy. Happy relationships feel impossibly distant to me, almost hypothetical, like world peace or ever finishing the book I’m working on.

Recently I got all crushed out on someone for the first time in a long time. She was someone I had known for years, but I had always assumed she didn’t consider me a candidate for a boyfriend, or even fling material. When she invited herself over on a pretext so transparently flimsy it could not be anything other than a proposition, I was shocked to learn how much I had wanted her, and for how long.

Of course, it was doomed as usual. The first thing she said when we came up for air from our first kiss was, “Jen shouldn’t know.” She thought for a moment. “Karen, either, probably.”

She was skittish about public displays of affection. Even though she was the one who had started it, she kept insisting the whole thing was a bad idea, totally unsustainable. We would both be traveling for the next several months, and there were, she pointed out, irreconcilable long-term incompatibilities between us. It would be better to quit while we were ahead. I believed we could get farther ahead before quitting.

Though I had already moved out of my apartment and was about to leave for the summer, I stayed on, holed up at her place, for three days longer than I had planned.

Each day, around midmorning, she would sheepishly ask whether I could delay my departure for one more day. When I asked why she didn’t just admit she wanted me to stay and I’d get a sublet for a week or two, she’d insist that no, no, no, it wouldn’t work out. I should leave tomorrow.