Pen Pals
Call me old-fashioned or avoidant or whatever, but I am obsessed with the idea of a pen pal. I’ve never had one and I want one so bad. There have been times when I’m about to re-download a dating app, and I consider writing to a prison inmate instead. Let me fall in love with somebody’s soul, goddammit. I want to masturbate to their handwriting.
Infirm Person and Caregiver
I don’t know if falling in love with someone who is dying is still a popular young-adult-novel trope (“A Walk to Remember,” “The Fault in Our Stars,” etc.), but it was when I was a teen. That popular plotline and my own personal, trauma-rooted fear of terminal illness have made this scenario seem like a likely option because I assume that whoever marries me will inevitably have to deal with my getting sick. Whenever I date someone, I think, Would you stay and take care of me, or would you run? I once told my siblings that my boyfriend at the time would make a “great cancer husband.” They understood immediately.
Gold and Gold-Digger
I like it when rich people know that they’re being loved for their money. Hell, most of us are being loved for one aspect of ourselves above all others. It may not be your bank account, it may be your kindness or sense of humor or massive hog, but there’s one thing that your partner mentions first every time they’re asked to list your positive qualities.
Common-Law Divorced
This is a popular one. You hate each other but you stay married anyway—avoiding eye contact in the hallway, curling up on opposite ends of the couch, buying a California-king mattress—just a couple of martyrs keeping it together for the kids.
Phantom of the Opera and Innocent Ingénue
At this point, I’m too old to be the latter, so I will have to find a mask that fits.
Strapping Young Man and Worldly Withholding Woman
I’m not sure how old I have to be to do this, but I feel like it’s forty. You can probably start sooner if you’ve had more life experience and are willing to date younger—I personally couldn’t stomach anyone under the age of twenty-seven. For me, forty feels like the point at which I will start considering this option. (This arrangement is not to be confused with Old Soul and Cradle Robber, which we all know is disgusting.)
Cheating Genius and Loyal Wife
I think it’s sort of chic to make peace with your husband’s infidelity. To have people divulge his indiscretions to you, in an attempt to save you from this life, only to have you take a long drag of your cigarette and say, “You think I don’t know? That’s very sweet, darling. But I know who I married.”
Nun and God
If I get desperate enough, I will return to my old flame—the Lord. Sure, He tells you what to do and wear, but He’s not around that much. And you get so much quality time with other equally yoked women.
Addict and Vice
If I spend too many Christmases alone, this is bound to happen. I will develop an all-consuming addiction in the place of true love. (A low-energy addiction, of course. Booze or weed, not sex or bungee jumping.)
Fuck Buddies at the Old Folks’ Home
Better late than never, right? I would be O.K. with a lifelong lack of action if I got to have a powerful, whirlwind romance right at the buzzer. Maybe my roommate is another woman who devoted her life to her career and now, at ninety-seven, is finally slowing down. Maybe we start out as friends. Then, one day, our watery eyes meet over bowls of bland oatmeal and we just know. We die trying to have sex. Everyone talks about it for weeks. If you can’t have a good marriage, have a good story. ♦
This is drawn from “Actually, Nevermind.”
