Danielle "Dani" Joyce has been working long hours and living paycheck to paycheck to keep her bakery, The Dough Divas, open. Spending all her time at the store, her only romantic outlet is to crush on regulars like Justin Waverly. She keeps her flir...
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I woke up the next morning still uncertain about what exactly my relationship to Justin was. Had my flight from dinner shut the door on the matter or had I simply stalled for time?
I had no further obligation to the family and so I could just continue on with my life as if nothing happened. Yet the following morning, in between rushes, I made use of the internet's breadth of knowledge regarding public records. I discovered that Justin's last name was Sanders, that his parents had owned that home for thirty-two years, and that their annual property tax was the same as several months' worth of rent for us.
I went out and bought myself a little notebook soon afterward. Over the course of the week, I jotted down notes on whatever I could scrounge up on Justin to help me better understand my so-called fiancé. It, admittedly, felt a bit stalkery as I cycled through well over a decade's worth of posts on his Facebook timeline, but considering we were tying the knot, I figured I was allowed some leeway on the matter.
I puzzled together the bits and pieces I gathered from his social media and whatever I remembered from our talks over the previous months, which developed a fairly comprehensive history of my mysterious crush. I found he had graduated a couple of years before me with a degree in modern linguistics, apparently with a focus on German; though I discovered a few Facebook posts in other European languages. He had a pretty serious girlfriend in college that lasted past his graduation date, but they had a messy breakup that I only picked up on from vague posts and passive aggressive comments. I'm not proud of it, but I did a bit of research on her, too. I, however, was relieved to find she was now happily married on the other side of the country with two kids and a dog.
He also earned himself a master's in finance at a renowned private university some states away. There he had a few minor relationships and took an internship at a marketing company where he localized ads. After he graduated from that school, he came back to the city and took a position at Berger and Smith — a name I didn't recognize until I discovered it was the parent company of many, many brands that all had seemingly nothing to do with each other. Once he started handling the distribution of some of Berger and Smith's products in Germany, the stream of relationships tapered off. It wasn't surprising. I saw all too well how often Justin had to fly out to Europe.
I felt a little sad for him. He'd been without a serious relationship for longer than I had. I knew how lonely that felt.
"Anything new today?" Mindy looked over at me from her workstation, where she piled slices of Italian bread with tuna salad.
"No, I think I've soaked up every bit of information there is to know about Justin Christopher Sanders." I pushed my phone away, hiding it behind our disposable glove box, before retrieving a loaf of wheat to cut for Mindy in the back workstation.
"Did you try looking up criminal records? Those are public too, aren't they?"
Her tone was joking, but I knew she was still concerned about the whole situation. I couldn't blame her. If she told me some guy she barely knew had randomly announced they were engaged to his whole family, I'd be telling her to run for the hills, too.
