Being alone has meant buying an old lady roller cart so that I can wheel groceries into my apartment and a rubber gadget that allows me to open jars on my own. Being alone has meant failing at being alone, and convincing myself that I’m not at all interested in sex. This is mostly true, but there’s still a real part of me that cares. And if I cave and spend the night at the most recent boyfriend’s house, then I will pass the morning, which I intended to spend writing and working, because I am a serious independent woman whose priority is working and writing, as I did today, googling the 22-year-old girl who told him she wants to “bone down,” whom I’ve met briefly, only to be reminded by a fancy magazine that she is the daughter of a big producer, and prefers ballet flats to heels. He asks me what he should do about other women. I want to scream, but I say I can’t tell him what to do. Why? he says. They always ask me why. He only wants to be with me, he says, why can’t I just be with him. It’s a question I’ve heard from each side many times. The answer is because I love them both. And because I don’t have the heart, because I lack the strength, to choose, I have to say no.
Ada Kaplan, The Object of Their Affections