One of my favorite things about Philadelphia is that, in a lot of ways, it reminds me of Charleston. Sure, it’s a major city, but when it comes to knowing your neighbors and their dirty laundry, it starts to resemble a small town. Like Charleston, it seems like everyone is one person away from knowing everyone else. When my girlfriend Julia, who lived here during her college years, comes in from NYC to visit, it’s far from unusual to run into people she either knows, hates, or slept with. That’s just how it goes here. It’s also not a rare thing for my boyfriend, D*, to do the same.

I guess I should fill you in on the details. Yes, after almost a year and a half of practicing and praising the virtues of singledom, I have a serious boyfriend. Not just a, “yeah, we’re exclusively dating” kind of boyfriend, but a “he told me he loves me” kind of boyfriend. Believe me, I’m just a shocked as you. He’s met the ‘rents, gives me back massages whenever I ask nicely, and has seen me pee on my less-than-ladylike occasions. After all that, he still wants to be my boyfriend. I just cannot scare this guy away, and surprisingly to everyone including myself, I’m glad. I’m not afraid to admit that my feelings for him are mutual.

Sadly, D took a 2 month gig in the Washington area before he begins grad school in the fall, so he had to take off quite soon after we met. But on the bright side, the boy has driven back to Philly every weekend just to spend it with me. In a weird way, that’s made our short time together more special and exciting. It’s sad to say “Seacrest out!” to him every Sunday night, but as soon at the end of the work week draws closer, I can feel my school girl giddiness build up to a crescendo.

His first weekend back was great. In the morning, I threw on a brand new polka dot, low cut dress, while D rocked a black-button down shirt (he knows I love button-down shirts on men, and is perfectly happen to feed into my odd little fetishes.) We spent the day doing two of my favorite things — getting falafel pitas to-go from Saad’s Halaal, then having lunch on a bench in Clark Park while watching the kiddie larpers play Capture the Flag with foam weapons and serious gusto. We made our way to the other side of the park, perusing the flea market booths while hand-in-hand, and eventually ended up in an area called “The Dog Bowl”, a small valley designated for leashless dogs to play and sniff eachother’s asses. Then we ran into the ex-girlfriend.

Not just an ex-girlfriend, but the one right before me. The one he lived with. The one he was with for 2 solid years. Not that I was aware of all this as they said their hellos and engaged in small talk, but I did start picking up on the signs. She asked specific questions about his family. She reminisced briefly about shared experiences with D. She asked me if I had met his mother’s dogs yet.

It wasn’t an uncomfortable encounter, at least for me. As we said our goodbyes and went our separate ways, D put his arm around me and said, “Well, that was awkward…”

“Let me guess. Ex-girlfriend?”, I replied.

“Yeah, I hope that wasn’ t too weird for you.”

And it wasn’t. Of course until then, I never really gave his exes much thought. They were just these characters in his various little anecdotes, who didn’t exist further than that. Running into one in the flesh felt strange, but was inevitable in a town like Philly. Jeez Louise, just wait until he comes to Charleston. He’ll meet more guys I’ve slept with then he cares to know about. Whadaya want, I went through a phase! At least I’m honest about it.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t I want to know everything about her — what it was about her he loved, how she was in bed, why it didn’t work, but I kept my piehole shut. I didn’t want to work him up into a frenzy by bringing up old memories, and figured if there was anything I needed to know, it would come up with time.

I was concerned about D’s mental state after running into someone who played such a large role in his past, but he seemed fine. In fact, as we sat on a bench and decompressed from the impromptu reunion, he kissed me on my forehead, then said, “I’m kind of glad she saw me with you. I know this is silly, but I felt like, ‘Hey, HEY, looky what I got!’”

It wasn’t silly. I looked damn good in that dress and she knew it.