One True Loves

by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Olive flies in from Chicago to see you. Everyone assumes she will stay at her parents’ place but you feel immense relief when she says she’d rather make up a bed on the floor of your room. She doesn’t ask how you are because she knows there’s no answer. Instead, she tells you that she’s thinking of giving up caffeine and makes you help her Facebook-stalk the man she just began seeing. You feel less alone when she’s there, which is a welcome reprieve from the crushing loneliness you feel almost all the time.