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the winter. Though Jai wasn’t thrilled with my bluntness and my know-it-all attitude, she said I was the most positive, upbeat person she’d ever met. And she was bringing out good things in me. I found myself caring about her welfare and happiness more than anything else.
    Eventually, I asked her to move to Pittsburgh. I offered to get her an engagement ring, but I knew she was still scared and that would freak her out. So I didn’t pressure her, and she did agree to a first step: moving up and getting her own apartment.
    In April, I made arrangements to teach a weeklong seminar at UNC. That would allow me to help her pack up so we could drive her belongings up to Pittsburgh.
    After I arrived in Chapel Hill, Jai told me we needed to talk. She was more serious than I had ever seen her.
    “I can’t come to Pittsburgh. I’m sorry,” she said.
    I wondered what was in her head. I asked for an explanation.
    Her answer: “This is never going to work.” I had to know why.
    “I just…” she said. “I just don’t love you the way you want me to love you.” And then again, for emphasis: “I don’t love you.”
    I was horrified and heartbroken. It was like a punch in the gut. Could she really mean that?
    It was an awkward scene. She didn’t know how to feel. I didn’t know how to feel. I needed a ride over to my hotel. “Would you be kind enough to drive me or should I call a cab?”
    She drove me, and when we got there, I pulled my bag out of her trunk, fighting back tears. If it’s possible to be arrogant, optimistic and totally miserable all at the same time, I think I might have pulled it off: “Look, I’m going to find a way to be happy, and I’d really love to be happy with you, but if I can’t be happy with you, then I’ll find a way to be happy without you.”
    In the hotel, I spent much of the day on the phone with my parents, telling them about the brick wall I’d just smashed into. Their advice was incredible.
    “Look,” my dad said. “I don’t think she means it. It’s not consistent with her behavior thus far. You’ve asked her to pull up roots and run away with you. She’s probably confused and scared to death. If she doesn’t really love you, then it’s over. And if she does love you, then love will win out.”
    I asked my parents what I should do.
    “Be supportive,” my mom said. “If you love her, support her.”
    And so I did that. I spent that week teaching, hanging out in an office up the hall from Jai. I stopped by a couple of times, however, just to see if she was all right. “I just wanted to see how you are,” I’d say. “If there’s anything I can do, let me know.”
    A few days later, Jai called. “Well, Randy, I’m sitting here missing you, just wishing you were here. That means something, doesn’t it?”
    She had come to a realization: She was in love, after all. Once again, my parents had come through. Love had won out. At week’s end, Jai moved to Pittsburgh.
    Brick walls are there for a reason. They give us a chance to show how badly we want something.

17
Not All Fairy Tales End Smoothly
    J AI AND I were married under a 100-year-old oak tree on the lawn of a famous Victorian mansion in Pittsburgh. It was a small wedding, but I like big romantic statements, and so Jai and I agreed to start our marriage in a special way.
    We did not leave the reception in a car with cans rattling from the rear bumper. We did not get into a horse-drawn carriage. Instead, we got into a huge, multicolored hot-air balloon that whisked us off into the clouds, as our friends and loved ones waved up to us, wishing us bon voyage. What a Kodak moment!
    When we had stepped into the balloon, Jai was just beaming. “It’s like a fairy tale ending to a Disney movie,” she said.
    Then the balloon smashed through tree branches on the way up. It didn’t sound like the destruction of the Hindenburg, but it was a little disconcerting. “No problem,” said the man flying the balloon.