We find our friends easily - the place is relatively empty - at the usual location of the young people - the dart boards. Already there are three games in progress. I quickly step up to take the place of a missing player.

I've never met two of the guys on the team, the third - an Aussie - I've drank with before on multiple occasions. Awkward as hell, and he smokes and drinks too much for my liking, but I'm still giving it a chance. I'll figure him out eventually. Vices are a shield. There's more to him than appears; I just have to crack the code. One of the new guys is chattier than the other. I take the bait and ask him a pile of questions. He smells faintly of body odor and has the pasty complexion of a sofware developer. I fire off a series of bullseyes and double bullseyes. Hidden talent. I'm terrible at billiards. The guys are suitably impressed. The other girls throw darts with limp wrists, and the darts bounce feebly off of the board due to lack of momentum. I plant another bullseye and then back off. I've made my point. I play in turn after the software developer. Each time he passes off the darts our hands brush together. I am entirely aware of this.

The game ends, and we disperse.

I meet a landscape architect who works for the city. I am immediately engaged. We talk nonstop for an hour. I like her so much that I want to eat her, the way that other people talk about eating up plump and fragrant babies. I ask her a million questions. Later, she finds out my profession and there is this aha! moment of her realizing that I understand everything that she's been talking about. It seals the deal, and I decide that I want to be her friend.

The next morning, Daniel and I lay in bed nursing hangovers.

He says to me, "You know what? I looked around last night and realized that you were the skinniest girl in the room."

Skinner than Alex? (The marathon runner)

"Yes."

"You might want to stop losing weight now. You've lost more fat that I think you realize."

I'd wanted to get to 125. I figured I'd stop at 125.