Reggie
Reggie's loft. The housewarming party. Michael and Sophie are the last to arrive.Sophie, it's nice to see you. You must be Michael. I'm Reggie. And this is my girlfriend Marissa.
Michael
He shakes Reggie's hand, then Marissa's, his grip warm but brief — a man who has already moved on to the room.Good to finally meet you both. Sophie's been talking about the dance club for weeks, so I had to come see the famous couple in person. This is a great place.
Sophie
Thank you for having us. Michael was worried about parking — he's already done a lap of the block.
Michael
I like to be on time. You've got a beautiful spot here — Sophie said the view made up for the stairs, and she was right.
Heather
Sophie. I've heard about the dancing. Someone has to keep my daughter from leading. I'm Heather — Marissa's mom.
Sophie
It's good to meet you. Marissa speaks very highly of you. I think she's the one keeping me moving, honestly.
Reggie
And this is Brynn, Marissa's friend from work.
Brynn
She steps forward, extends a hand first to Michael and then to Sophie, her smile quick and unguarded.Oh, hi — I've heard about you two from Marissa. She said you were the ones who actually keep up with Reggie out there. I'm Brynn.She grins.I work with Marissa. Sort of. We share a caffeine dependency.
Michael
Michael. And this is Sophie. It's good to put faces to the dance stories. Though I've seen clips — you all look better in person.
Heather
We're going to need more food if she dances half as well as she talks.
Reggie
I should say that this isn't really a housewarming party. I've lived here for five years. But Marissa just moved in and we're happy about that so we used it as an excuse to invite a few people over.
Michael
He smiles easily, already glancing toward the windows again.Ah, so it's a moving-in party with a housewarming chaser. Makes sense. Congratulations, Marissa.
Heather
She lifts her glass a little, a mother's pride in the gesture.The apartment didn't need warming. The girl has been warm since the day I met her. But I'll still drink to it.
Brynn
And I'm not letting either of them off the hook for the wine. Does the host of a not-housewarming still refill?
Reggie
I do indeed.Tops everyone's wine off
Heather
She sets down her refilled glass and looks Marissa over with the permission only a mother has.Three months ago my daughter was invisible in a room. I'm not exaggerating. She walked into a place and the light found everyone else first.A nod toward Reggie.Then this one put her on a dance floor and said spinach instead of magic, and now she's the most beautiful woman in any room. I'll let you settle how much of that is him. But I know what I saw.
Marissa
Mom. I did the spinach. I did the dancing. He just refused to let me do it alone. That's the whole secret.
Michael
You can see it, though. Sophie's been lighter on Thursdays too. I don't ask too many questions; I just notice.
Brynn
Okay, I'm officially asking where work fits into this whole spinach-and-dance pipeline, because you've been coming in Monday mornings looking like a completely different species and I deserve better than vague 'I slept well.' Is there a syllabus? A pamphlet?
Reggie
It's magic, Brynn. Eat less and exercise more. I should patent it.SmilesThe truth is Marissa did it and she deserves the credit, but I'm not falsely modest. She tried 20 times without me. With me, it was harder to avoid, and she had an incentive to succeed. I'm not fat. She was. And she wanted to not be partly because she was afraid I'd leave her for a skinny girl. I wouldn't have. I loved her when she was fat. I love her now that she's super healthy.
Marissa
She looks at Reggie, then shakes her head, half laughing, and addresses the room.And yes, I was afraid. But the fear wasn't the reason; he made it something I was allowed to want.She picks up her wine.I think that's the actual patent.
Sophie
The part he keeps missing is that she stopped being invisible before the weight came off. That was the first thing I saw on the Seawall. The body caught up later.
Heather
You loved her when she was fat and she heard it. That's the only part my daughter needed. The rest was physics.
Michael
Honest to the point of uncomfortable. I respect it. Though I think I'll skip the patent pitch for myself.
Reggie
You know the interesting part? When I approached her on the Skytrain (yes that's how we met, we're walking clichés) she was fat and insecure and totally invisible. Everyone ignored her. And she was suspicious of everyone who spoke to her kindly. Now, three months later, she's a hot blond with a toned beach body and every guy who sees her is interested. And we all get to see if that changes her. And I'm not watching as an impartial observer. I have skin in this game. But nobody knows whether this new reality will change her, including her.
Marissa
She holds Reggie's gaze, then looks around the room.You're talking about me like I'm a before-and-after in a magazine ad, and you're standing there waiting for the after to develop a personality. I already know what changes me: it's you, in this room, saying too much and meaning every word. So if anyone's an experiment, you're the one with the most to lose.
Heather
You didn't invent her, Reggie. You just finally paid attention. She was never invisible; you just saw her when the rest of you were looking past her. And now you're worried she'll change because the world finally caught up? She won't. She's too busy being mine.
Michael
You two met on the Skytrain? Sophie told me it was at a bar near the station. Or maybe that's a different story. Either way, I think the experiment's a good idea—seeing whether a woman changes when the world finally notices her. Though I suspect the answer is she stops needing to ask if she's enough. That's usually how it goes.
Reggie
Michael, both are true. I stood up to let an old lady sit on the train, and Marissa smiled at me, and then smiled again when I looked at her again, which I took as an invitation so I asked her if she'd join me for a drink at Rogue in Waterfront Station.
Michael
He glances at Sophie, then back to Reggie, the confusion clearing into amusement.Ah, so the bar was the second act. Sophie gave me the edited version — she does that when the story has too many moving parts.A short, unworried laugh.Honestly, the seat thing is the better story. Rogue would've sold it short.
Sophie
The train was the opening, the bar was where the evening landed. I only kept the part that fit in one sentence.
Brynn
Let the record show he gave up his seat to a little old lady and still managed to close. That's not a red flag. That's a green banner. And now I need to know if Rogue's truffle fries were involved, because those things are a known hazard and I refuse to believe romance survived them.
Reggie
Ha! I warned her about the truffle fries. She stayed away from them. But you know the one who disappointed me the most wasn't Marissa, it was Heather.
Heather
Me?Horrified
Reggie
Yes. I had expected all kinds of pushback about me. I don't have a family as most of you know. I expected Heather to raise some red flags there, and let's be frank, I'm brown and don't even know what race I am which complicates things even though people wish it wouldn't. And so I had composed lengthy arguments and points in my head to defend it. And you know what she said when I met her and raised the fact that I was brown and grew up poor? "I don't give a shit." That's all I got.Laughs
Marissa
She looks at her mother, then back at Reggie, grinning.Mom, you were supposed to be the hard one. You gave him three words and he's been bragging about it for months.To the room.I think she was just trying to finish her soup before it got cold.
Michael
Sounds like you got off easy. Usually the mother-in-law makes you sweat. No offence—I mean that as a compliment to both of you.
Brynn
Wait, hold on. You wrote a speech? Like, prepared arguments? For your girlfriend's mom? Please tell me it had bullet points. That's the kind of overthink I need to hear about.
Heather
She sets her glass down.You thought you'd have to argue. That's what all those bullet points were — an argument you didn't need. I'd been watching you for twenty minutes before we were introduced. You pulled out her chair, you fixed her collar without being asked, and you looked at her the way a man looks at the only warm light in a room. "I don't give a shit" wasn't shorthand. It was the entire evaluation. He passed.
Brynn
Okay, but was there a full opening statement? Because I'm now imagining a three-ring binder and I won't be talked down.
Marissa
There was no binder. It was on his phone. I found the notes app. 'Meeting with Heather — possible objections.' He had numbered sections. I made him show me. Four objections and a conclusion. He's never once prepared that hard for a client.
Reggie
It's true, I haven't. I don't really care if a client signs up or not. Each client is only worth $150 a year to me. So an individual client doesn't matter but the client-body matters as a whole. This is different. I only want one girlfriend. It matters.
Marissa
She looks at Reggie, then glances at her mother.You have a client body and a girlfriend, and the girlfriend is the one you made a notes app for.She picks up her wine.I'd say that's the least romantic thing I've ever heard, except I know exactly which folder it's in and how many times you edited it. That's the romance. I'm keeping it.
Heather
The conclusion probably said something like proceed. That's all he needed. I didn't ask his intentions. I asked my daughter if she was happy. She said yes. That's the whole exam. The bullet points were for him, not for me. He needed to believe he'd done the work. Most men don't.
Michael
I had to win Sophie's mother over with five years of carrying things up from the car. You did it with bullet points and a salad. Some of us are working harder than others.
Sophie
You only want one girlfriend. I should put that on the dance club tagline. Very economical. It's also the correct answer. The rest is just logistics.
Reggie
We already have a tagline. We all approved it. When hips turn, every occasion awakens. I don't want to change it. I thought of making this evening a dance party but Marissa vetoed it.
Marissa
She sweeps a hand toward the room.I vetoed a dance party because this is a loft, not a studio. You would have had us moving the sofa and watching the downstairs neighbour file a noise complaint before the pork buns were gone. The tagline stays. I never said otherwise.
Sophie
The dance party died when Marissa said the word neighbours. She's right. The Seawall is three blocks away and it has no ceiling. The tagline was the only part of his vision that survived the veto. I wasn't letting him touch that either.
Michael
When hips turn, every occasion awakens. I don't know what it means, but it sounds like something you'd see on the side of a yoga studio. Sophie, you didn't tell me the dance club had branding. I thought you just got sweaty on the path.
Reggie
Ok, she's right, I admit it. Dancing on the seawall would be fun but it's not a chance to get to know people, and all of you are invited to our Thursday night dance club sessions where we really do dance on the seawall. Although I'm not sure what we'll do in winter. Dancing in the rain is best in movies.
Brynn
She sets her glass down with a small decisive clink.I'm in. Thursdays on the Seawall with an actual speaker? That's the best invitation I've had since someone tried to draft me into a stair-climbing cult.She grins.I'll bring layers and learn the footwork. I should warn you, I'm a terrible follow when I've had wine.
Michael
Thursdays are my one truly blocked-out night, unfortunately. University crowd, same table for years. Sophie's the dancer in the family. I'll keep up through the clips.
Heather
I'll settle for warmth, wine, and a front-row seat to whatever this dance club turns into in the rain. If you all start improvising in a downpour, I'm taking video.
Reggie
Gives Marissa a look meaning "Oh shit, I didn't think Brynn would say yes."Heather, I still haven't forgiven you for not complaining that I'm brown. But seriously, winter is a thing we're going to have to figure out. We have a few months before the seawall becomes impossible. I'll look into the new community centre in Coal Harbour. Or maybe the YWCA on Hornby will let us do it if we buy memberships. We'll see.
Marissa
She catches the look and returns it, one eyebrow up, very deliberately.You heard her. She said yes. You can't uninvite her now without looking like the man who only wants to dance with women who won't say yes.To Brynn, warmer.He'll figure out the winter part. He's already pretending the YWCA was his idea all along.
Brynn
I should be careful, then. I'd hate to be the first girl who ever said yes and ruined the whole club. I'll bring a raincoat and no shame. Those are the only two requirements, I'm guessing.
Heather
I like this one. If you're looking for a winter floor, the community centre has a gym room with a mirrored wall and a piano that hasn't been tuned since the nineties. I'll call in a favour if you want an indoor session before the rain turns spiteful.
Michael
For what it's worth, Sophie really has been lighter on Thursdays. So if the club moves indoors, I'll still be the one watching clips and asking what the tagline means over dinner. My contribution is staying out of the way.
Reggie
The YWCA was Marissa's idea. And yes, we'll figure it out. And Brynn, of course you're welcome. You know all the stuff people say about Vancouver being a sexless city? It seems to be true from what we experience. We really don't get a lot of attention. Specifically male attention. They don't see hot girls dancing and catcall. They look for a second and turn back to their phones and keep walking. It surprised me.
Brynn
She grins and taps the stem of her wineglass with one finger.Well, I'm glad my yes didn't break the club. And I'd take the phone zombies over a catcall any day. A guy who keeps walking while you're killing it on the Seawall is a man who's already learned the only useful lesson Vancouver bothers to teach: don't make it weird.
Michael
I'd say the polite part is the point. A man who looks for two seconds and walks on is giving you the only review Vancouver knows how to leave. If he's not being a problem, that's his version of applause.
Reggie
You all might be right but I think you're underselling it. We're known as the loneliest city in Canada for a reason. Almost everyone I know under 30 is lonely at different levels. Everyone has been rejected 1000 times and most seem to have given up. That's what's going on as I see it, not people being too polite to stare.
Michael
I knew a guy who moved here from Montreal. Said the same thing — friendly, polite, no one's ever actually available. I figured he just missed his old table. Then he moved back and we got a Christmas card.
Heather
When I was your age we didn't need a diagnosis for it. We just called it Tuesday. But at least we had to say it to a face.
Reggie
That's exactly right, Heather. Today, "no" is a swipe, and ghosting is considered a decent way to break up with someone. And yes, I suppose this isn't just Vancouver. It just feels like it to me because I live here. But it does seem worse here to me. I spent 6 months in Montréal once and I still have friends from there. In this city, I know people who have lived here for decades and still have no friends.
Heather
She picks up her glass again but doesn't drink yet.I moved into my townhouse a year after the divorce and didn't know a soul. I met my neighbour by knocking to borrow a cup of sugar I didn't need. I brought it back with a batch of scones. That's the whole secret, if you want one. You have to need someone for something small.
Michael
The Thursday group works because nobody has to be version two of themselves. Same table, same bad nachos, same old arguments about football. Low stakes. You can't build much on low stakes, but you can't be lonely on them either, I suppose.
Brynn
I asked my neighbour for sugar once. She handed me a Splenda packet and closed the door. That's Vancouver in one sentence. I can't decide if it's a cautionary tale or a challenge.
Reggie
I don't mean to bring race into everything. I've already joked about Heather's reaction to me. But you know, I grew up thinking it would be easier to be white. I'm not sure anymore. The most unkind interactions I see tend to be between people of the same race. White people fighting with other white people. Brown people fighting with other brown people. Chinese people fighting with other Chinese people. I sometimes wonder if I have it easier because I'm brown and nobody wants to look racist so very few people tell me to piss off. They might say no but they're polite about it.
Marissa
You started with race and ended with wanting to be told to piss off, Reggie. That is the most you thing you've said tonight. But you're not actually hoping for more hostility — you're hoping people mean what they say. There's a difference.
Michael
I think you've got the mechanism right, but I'd widen it. Most people are doing cost-benefit analysis, not race math. They don't want the trouble. Race is just one of the costs they're avoiding. Doesn't make it warmer, though.
Heather
I didn't go easy on you because you're brown. I went easy on you because you were good to her, and because I don't waste good irritation on a man who passes. But if it helps, if I ever do dislike you, you'll hear it direct, and probably with less polish.
Reggie
No it doesn't turn indifference into warmth, but honestly, I'll take it. If the answer is no, I'd rather hear "No thank you" than "Piss off". But I'm in the position of a guy who is willing to approach people and take no for an answer. It's harder for girls today. I met a girl yesterday who told me she's 29 and has never had a boyfriend. She doesn't like the apps and nobody approaches her and she doesn't want to approach men, which I understand. It just seems men have generally stopped approaching women these days.
Marissa
She sets her wine down and angles toward Reggie, no longer performing for the room.That girl could have been me. I wasn't going to walk up to you first, not even after the weight was gone. I needed you to do exactly what you did.
Sophie
The cost of being wrong went up, so men stopped risking the wrong. Women who won't chase get left in the quiet. I know that woman.
Michael
You're a rare breed, Reggie. Most of us would be too scared to approach. Easier to stay at the table with the same five friends than risk the no.
Reggie
Michael, no, I have a ton of insecurities. I told Marissa when she was chubby that I'd be jealous of the attention she got if she lost weight and then helped her lose it anyway. And now I sit here watching her get attention and don't think for one second that I don't feel it every single time. And I have racial insecurities, and economic insecurities, and appearance insecurities and social status insecurities. In other words, I'm a normal human.
Marissa
You've been saying that to me since the night you told me to lose the weight and promised you'd hate the attention. Normal is the wrong word. Most people feel all of it and hide it. You just feel it and let me see. That's not normal; that's the whole reason I stayed.
Heather
Reggie, if you're normal, then every man I've known was furniture. You're not normal. You're just not ashamed. Those are different animals, and I'm drinking to the second one.
Michael
I'd settle for being able to say that out loud. Most of us just build a quieter version. You've made honesty the whole feature. That's not normal, but I think we could all use a little less normal.
Reggie
I don't know. All of you seem to be unusually honest to me. Perhaps not announcing your insecurities to the world, but none of you are denying them. And to my considerable surprise and pleasure, absolutely nobody here seems to be putting on a show or trying to impress anyone else.
Heather
You think this is honesty, Reggie? Wait until I've had dessert. I'll start telling people what I actually thought of their hair. But you're right. No one here needs to impress anyone. That's why we stayed.
Michael
I'd take the compliment, but I suspect wine does more of the heavy lifting than we give it credit for. Still, it's a good room. You make people want to say the thing they've been chewing on.
Brynn
I absolutely wore my good earrings to impress you, so I'm ruining your theory. But fine — the room's honest, the pork buns are honest, and I'm honestly about to ask about dessert. That's the downside of no performance. We get greedy.
Reggie
Oh my God, are those real, Brynn? You shouldn't wear those here. I mean, Vancouver is safe but this is Robson & Seymour and drug addicts outnumber girls wearing real diamonds 100 to 1.
Brynn
She reaches up and touches one earring, turning her head just enough that the light catches it.They're moissanite. Real sparkle, no inheritance.A grin.But thank you for the security briefing, Reggie — I'll keep the actual family jewels at home next time.
Heather
Back in my day you put the good earrings in your bra before you crossed Hastings. Some of us survived to tell the story. So let the girl shine; you can be her neighbourhood watch from here.
Michael
I think Reggie's just being a good host. First time I walked around here, a man told me my watch was making me a target. I still don't know if he was warning me or negotiating. Either way, I didn't run.
Reggie
You know, I'm being a bit stupid. The thief only learns if the earrings are real or the watch is real after he's stolen it and is trying to turn it into cash. Someone with $10 Shoppers Drug Mart earrings or watches is just as at-risk as Brynn or Michael. The only variable is how disappointed the thief is later, which is irrelevant to the victim.
Brynn
So I could get mugged for my sparkly costume jewellery exactly the same as for a fortune. That's weirdly freeing. I'm going to call my cheap taste a security strategy.
Michael
Then the warning was about the walk, not the watch. I'll stop crediting it with insight. Though I'll probably still check my wrist crossing Hastings.
Reggie
Yes but it's still an easier day for me to lose my $200 Google Watch than for Michael to lose whatever expensive-looking thing he's wearing.Smiles
Michael
He glances down at his wrist, turning the watch face toward him, then shrugs easily.It's a Citizen my father gave me after undergrad. Probably worth thirty cents on the dollar and only to me.He looks up, a small smile.So we're all equally safe, and equally sentimental.
Heather
You keep a thing that long because it's yours, not because it's worth anything. That's the difference between a man and a man with things. You're all right, Michael.
Sophie
He's better than all right. That watch once saved us from a missed ferry because he refuses to set it to a phone. Annoying and correct. That's Michael in two parts.
Reggie
I love that brand. Citizen makes really nice watches at sane prices. They look expensive, work well, and don't require second mortgages.
Michael
He glances at his wrist, then back at Reggie with a small, easy nod.My father thought the same thing. He said a watch should outlast a trend.A short smile.So far, it has.
Sophie
Michael and his father had exactly one philosophical agreement. It was the watch. He still quotes it at sales counters.
Brynn
And now I need the ferry story with the watch. You can't just drop that and leave it there. Did you sprint? Did he carry you onto the boat? I need details.
Michael tells the story and everyone smiles.
Marissa
As the smiles from Michael's ferry story settle, Marissa turns toward Reggie.You know we've been talking about taste all evening. Watches, earrings, what's worth keeping. I want to know what you think of mine. My taste. Not just in jewellery. In everything — the people I keep, the choices I've made since that train. Do you think I have good taste?
Reggie
I do. And I'm not just saying that. I don't tend to lie, as you know. And I absolutely love that you don't spend a lot of money and when you told me you shopped at thrift stores I started playing long game. But here's the interesting thing. I want to show you two photos.I muck with my phone and find both, and arrange them on the phone screen, and pass the phone around. Both show Marissa in the same yoga top, one when she was chubby and one when she was thin.Look at the two photos, wearing the same top, one when she was chubby and one recent photo of her. I find that the top when she was chubby looks cheap, and the exact same top on her now looks expensive. I have no explanation.
Marissa
She takes the phone from Reggie's hand, her thumb moving between the two photos, and studies them for a moment with the faintest smirk.So the shirt didn't change, but the way you looked at it did.She looks up at him.That's not about the fabric, baby. That's about the woman wearing it. Cheap is a story other people tell about you. Expensive is the one you tell yourself.
Sophie
It's the same shirt, but the body in it stopped apologizing. That's the upgrade. No store sells it.
Michael
I think you're all overcomplicating it. She looks good, and clothes look good on her. That's not a mystery. Some things are just true.
He sets his glass down, turning his body a few degrees toward Reggie, but the tone stays easy, genuinely curious rather than probing.So when you say you don't tend to lie — that's not the same as I never lie. I'm not asking for a confession. I just want to know if you pick your moments. Whether the truth has a price, and you pay it when you can afford to.
Sophie
It's the difference between a lie and a withheld truth. One is a wall. The other is just a door with no handle on your side. He doesn't pretend the door opens if it doesn't.
Brynn
See, I'd settle for a man who tells me the truth before the third glass. This one does it before the first. Long as we're grading on a curve.
Reggie
It's a valid question, and one I've given a lot of thought to. There are different categories of lies. Obviously there's the straightforward falsehood. Sophie noted another category, the lie of omission. Heinlein once said that another form of lying is to tell the total truth but do it so unconvincingly that nobody believes you. I've never pulled that one off. But still, they're all lies to me. The idea is to deceive people. To hide the truth, and whether the truth is replaced with uncertainty or a false narrative, the goal is the same, specifically that the listener doesn't believe the actual truth. And yes, I do that sometimes. I sometimes replace the truth with a false narrative, and I believe every functional adult does the same thing.
Michael
He nods slowly, turning his own glass on the table as if aligning the thought.So you don't lie. You just keep a ledger.A short, unbothered laugh.That's actually more honest than most men manage, and somehow less reassuring. But you've answered my question — you do pick your moments. I suppose we all do, when the truth costs somebody more than it's worth.
Heather
The only men who ever swore to me they never lie were the ones I caught in worse. I'd rather have the one who tells you he chooses, and then chooses well. At your age, the difference matters more than the confession.
Reggie
Nobody cares if someone says "I have to pee" when they actually have to poo. We all just accept that whatever they do in the bathroom is their business and shorthand for that is "I have to pee".
The other day a six-year-old girl saw us dancing on the seawall and joined us for a few songs. When her mom told her they had to go she came up to me and asked me very sincerely how her dancing was. The truth was she sucked badly. And I looked her in the face and told her she was great. And if any of you wouldn't have done the same thing, I wouldn't want to dance in public with you.
I knew a harmless old guy in the radio club, pleasant guy, totally unremarkable, not really good at anything but no harm in him. He got cancer and I visited him in the hospital in his last days. He asked me if people would remember him. It was obviously important to him. The truth is I think most of the club had already forgotten him. I told him yes, of course he would be remembered and missed. A total lie.
I don't regret any of those lies. Not one. And I'd lie again in those situations.
The other day a six-year-old girl saw us dancing on the seawall and joined us for a few songs. When her mom told her they had to go she came up to me and asked me very sincerely how her dancing was. The truth was she sucked badly. And I looked her in the face and told her she was great. And if any of you wouldn't have done the same thing, I wouldn't want to dance in public with you.
I knew a harmless old guy in the radio club, pleasant guy, totally unremarkable, not really good at anything but no harm in him. He got cancer and I visited him in the hospital in his last days. He asked me if people would remember him. It was obviously important to him. The truth is I think most of the club had already forgotten him. I told him yes, of course he would be remembered and missed. A total lie.
I don't regret any of those lies. Not one. And I'd lie again in those situations.
Michael
He sets his glass down slowly, turning it once on the table before looking at Reggie.You don't lie for yourself. You lie for the person in front of you. I told my daughter last week that her drawing of a dog looks exactly like our neighbour's Bernese. It looks like a potato with legs. I'd say it again tonight and sleep fine. So I'm not in a position to lecture you about honesty. The bathroom thing is just politeness we all do. The dying man... that's different. That's mercy. I think most of us would have done the same and called it something else.
Brynn
I'd have told the kid she was great too. I once told my niece she was a better dancer than me after she stepped on my foot three times. That's not a lie, that's just not being a monster. I think the part that matters is you don't lie to get out of consequences. You lie to give someone something they need. That's different.
Reggie
No, you're all being too kind. I do sometimes lie just for my own advantage, and just to get out of consequences. I gave a homeless guy $20 and talked to him like he was a human being. He was so starved for companionship and fellowship that he talked for ten minutes, and when I said I had to go and eat (my first lie, I wasn't hungry) he then asked me if we could go and eat together and he could pay for himself because he had $20. I told him I couldn't, I had to work and was just going to grab something on the way and I took off. 100% a lie for my own convenience and to escape the natural consequences of treating an attention-starved human being like a human instead of an animal. But I won't sugar coat it and call it anything other than a lie because that's what it was.
Michael
He taps the rim of his glass once.You paid him twenty dollars and then paid yourself back by calling it work. That part you already know. But I've done the same with less excuse. Sophie's mother's birthday last spring, I said I had a deadline. There was no deadline, I just didn't want to spend four hours in a warm kitchen pretending to care about someone else's memories. So if we're ranking lies for self-convenience, I'm not above you.
Sophie
She looks down at the table, then at Reggie, her voice quieter than before, more careful.The thing you gave him wasn't the twenty or the ten minutes. It was the part where you looked at him like a person. And then you took it back with the word work. That's the real cruelty: you proved he was starved for it, and then you showed him exactly how little of it you had left to give. That isn't a lie of convenience, that's a small abandonment. I've done that too, but I'm not going to call it neutral.
Heather
You gave him twenty dollars and ten minutes. Most people give him nothing. Then you beat yourself up for not giving him your whole evening. That's not honesty, that's self-importance. You're not required to be that man's last friend just because you were his first in a while. You left with a lie because you didn't know how to leave with the truth. That's not a sin, that's just being a person who doesn't have a script for every heartbreak. Now stop confessing and pour me more wine.
Reggie
If Marissa asks me if she looks fat in a dress, I'll tell her the truth because I love her and I want her to know my word is the truth, even when it hurts. If a total stranger asks me if she looks fat in the dress she's wearing, I'll probably say she looks great, even though she has a life-size tattoo of a whale on her thigh.
So the end result is I lie. I lie to kids. I lie to dying people. I lie to poor people. I lie to adults. I lie to women. I lie to men. I lie to whoever I want. And yet I consider myself among the most honest people I know.
So the end result is I lie. I lie to kids. I lie to dying people. I lie to poor people. I lie to adults. I lie to women. I lie to men. I lie to whoever I want. And yet I consider myself among the most honest people I know.
Michael
I lied to my daughter about the potato dog. I didn't call it a lie. I called it being a father. But you call it what it is, and then you still do it. That's the part I can't decide if it's better or worse. It's certainly harder. You make honesty look exhausting, Reggie.
Brynn
I once told my boss I was late because of a Skytrain delay. It was a hangover. So if we're ranking liars, I'm probably below the dying-man and the whale-tattoo lady. But interesting that you'd tell the truth to Marissa about the dress but not to a stranger about the whale. That's the whole game.
Reggie
Michael, you're the only other guy here. And the dance group is getting heavy on girls. Are you sure you won't join us?
Michael
He turns his glass slowly on the table, his expression easy, not evasive.You're going to make me the only man who turned down the dance club twice. I'm flattered, but Thursdays are the one night I keep for the same table and the same cold nachos I've been eating since 2015. I'd just slow the music down.
Sophie
She glances from Michael to Reggie, her tone dry but warm.He means he'd spend the whole session watching the path for pickpockets and asking what the tagline means. You're better off with the girls.
Reggie
Ok fine. But Heather, you're not getting off so easy. Come and join us at least once. My dancer radar is going off with you. I just get the vibe that you can dance.
Heather
She tilts her head, holding Reggie's gaze over the rim of her wineglass, then sets the glass down with a little more ceremony than necessary.You get one Thursday. And if I pull something, you're carrying my sensible shoes back to the car and you'd better believe I own a pair. I could dance before you were born, but I'll still let you lead.
Marissa
I hope you're ready. She used to win little disco contests at the Legion when I was a kid, and she still dusted me at my cousin's wedding. I'd love it if you came, Mom.
Michael
He checks the Citizen on his wrist, then sets his empty glass on the table with a small decisive click.We should get going. Sophie's mother has been with our daughter all evening, and I'd rather not make her wait longer than she already has.He looks to Reggie and Marissa.This was a genuinely good night. Thank you both.
Sophie
I'll help clear before we go. The pork buns were too good to leave you with all the dishes.
Marissa
No, you two get out of here. I'll walk you down — the stairs are the real test after all this wine. I'll be back in five minutes. Don't solve the tagline without me.
Brynn
I should head out too, actually. But someone has to tell me what 'when hips turn, every occasion awakens' actually means, or I'm going to spend my whole commute coming up with worse versions.
Heather
Go on. I'll stay and keep the last of the wine company. The tagline's not mine to decode, but if you figure it out on the train, send it to the group. That's the only homework.
The goodbyes are quick — coats, keys, the sound of the door, Marissa leading Michael and Sophie down the stairs while Brynn follows with one last wave. The loft settles into the quiet of a party that ended not with a bang but with the natural drift of people who don't want to overstay.