"I move through the crowd with ease, sharing nods and smiling hellos. I love this scene, this floating reality. I am a solo flier looking out over the land of Boyfriends and Girlfriends. I am three notes in the middle of a song. Joni grabs me and Tony, pulling us into Self-Help. There are a few monkish types already there, some of them trying to ignore the music and learn the Thirteen Ways to Be an Effective Person.

I know Joni's brought us here because sometimes you just have to dance like a madman in the Self-Help section of your local bookstore. So we dance. Tony hesitates—he isn't much of a dancer. But as I've told him a million times, when it comes to true dancing, it doesn't matter what you look like—it's all about the joy you feel. Zeke's jive is infectious. People are crooning and swooning into one another. You can see the books on the shelves in kaleidoscope form—spinning rows of colors, the passing blur of words. I sway. I sing. I elevate. My friends are by my side, and Zeke is working the Huguenots into his melody."

He loved me, then he loved me not. Now he needs me. I'm sure pretty soon he'll need me not.