I have a fake boyfriend and, before I get too far into the details, I know this makes me sound a little pathetic. But hear me out. I’ve gotten to a point in my perpetually-single life where I feel the need to compensate for never having an answer to the question, “Anyone special, these days?” My stand-in long-time answer used to be, “lots of guys and none of them are special,” but this sort of makes me sound like I have a parade of men marching through my love life, which is just not true. So I’ve devised a new answer for when I’m inevitably asked that at large family gatherings or for when I run into a friend I haven’t seen in a while. And I’ve put a lot of effort into creating someone who I think is the perfect fake boyfriend. He goes by the name Ryan Gosling.