That none of this is fake to me, though it might have started as an arrangement. One I didn’t want in the first place but has now provided me with daily access to this woman. It gave me the excuse to be near her, to have her under my roof, to get to know her better. At the same time, she feels somehow further away because of the contracts and papers and agreements between us. I want to ask her to be mine, for real, but I’m not sure the protocol for asking a woman to go steady when she’s already wearing your engagement ring on her finger.
