Coming May 5, 2026 from She Writes Press…
I adore you! I couldn’t leave y’all hanging!
Below the paywall is the second half of CHAPTER ELEVEN of Widow in the City, A Memoir [working title and logo]. Become a paid subscriber for $9.90 for the whole year! You’ll be able to read the end of this story, the first draft of my memoir and everything in my archive 🎉.
At the end of Chapter Ten:
I vowed to act more intentionally, no attachments this time around. I hit the like button to match with him and thought,
Okay, Edward, let’s see what you’re all about.
I was grateful I didn’t have to start the chat first. If he messaged me by tomorrow, I would respond, but if he didn’t I would just unmatch. Easy peasy, right?
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Within five minutes of matching with Edward, he sent me a message.
Ed: Hi, it’s Ed. How are you, Cherry? Your profile caught my eye because I know what it’s like to lose someone you love. It really messed me up, and I just wanted to make sure you were okay.
Amy: Hi Ed, I’m okay. Sorry to hear you lost someone too. It sucks being alone all the time.
Ed: I know. It’s been four years for me. In some ways it gets better, but the pain is always there. I can relate to being emotionally unavailable, you aren’t alone.
I wanted to believe him that I wasn’t alone. We exchanged numbers, and I verified his identity. Ed preferred WhatsApp to texting but liked sending voice messages too. His voice wasn’t as deep as J’s, but it wasn’t high pitched or whiny either.
Ed was a travel writer, which I thought sounded cool. He also lived in Brooklyn Heights, which was inconvenient unless he came over to my place. He was cute, smart, had a degree in philosophy and owned a car.
He said he usually did one or two big trips a year, a month each where he would travel to several countries. While he was a freelancer, he did a lot of work for a well-known magazine, which was sending him to the Nordic countries in the spring.
Ed: I’ll be around for the rest of the winter. I may do a little US travel, but that would only be for long weekends here and there. For the most part I’m in town until April.
Amy: Okay, that sounds good. Are you around during the day this week? I can only meet while my son is in school, so usually 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.
Ed seemed nice enough, but we agreed to meet at my place in a couple of days for a “vibe check.” That seemed to be a normal operating procedure to start a relationship in which sex wasn’t considered transactional. If he got here and we didn’t have chemistry, we didn’t have sex. This felt safe and comfortable to me and alleviated any concerns I had about being pressured to do something I didn’t want to do.
So far, I liked Feeld because it attracted men who were clear about what they wanted. I had been clear in my bio about what I was looking for - casual and consistent companionship - and Ed understood that. I told him I wanted someone who would be available for the winter, not just for sex, but to chat with during the day.
What I really wanted was someone to hold me while I cried, but I would never ask for that. I was scared my vulnerability would drive any potential man who knew this about me away, and I didn’t want to drive Ed away before we had even met. I also didn’t think he would want to be reminded of his early grief, especially since he had admitted that even four years after his loss, he was still emotionally unavailable.
