Iris shrugged. “You know what, we weren’t right for each other. I knew it, too. He was nicer than he was boring, but he was boring. I probably didn’t like him as much as I wanted to like him.” She sat down with their drinks.

“Do you wonder about that?” David said. “How do you tell the difference?”

“Oh honey,” she said, clearly annoyed, that way Iris could communicate, How about this conversation is now over.

The rain continued, white noise as they talked in Iris’s cube of a living room. “Still nannying?” David said.

“Yeah. I started freelancing for this marketing company, too. I spend a lot of time on makeup blogs.”

“Excuse me?”

She waved her hand. “You don’t want to know. You know, there are quizzes out there that girls take? And they ask how long you spend on your face every morning, and the options go up to two hours, and I repeat, there are women taking these quizzes quite earnestly?”

“No,” David said dryly, “I didn’t know that, but I’m glad you get paid to know this.”

“I don’t even go into the office more than once a week,” Iris said. “Do it from home. In my pyjamas. Then again, I nanny in my pyjamas, too. You’re in my work clothes right now.”

“I feel so honoured!”

“You’d be the only one. How’s Ridwan?”

“Good. They fight with their girlfriend a lot; that’s kind of a shame.” Iris tsked. “I never liked her.”

“I dunno. I’ll miss them both. I’m moving next week,” said David. “Off the Jefferson L.”

“That’s real Bushwick, hon. But that’s cool. How’s Ray? You ever talk to him?”

“Um,” David said. “That’s not been so great.”

Iris’s face dropped. “Don’t tell me.”

David sucked in breath. “He wasn’t answering my calls for a while. And then, like, we were joking on this thread and I messaged him to say look what’s going on and he said he was just having a hard time talking to me because he’d known me for so long as a dude.”

“That sucks,” Iris said. “I’m sorry. You don’t deserve that.”

“Yeah,” David said. “Well.”

“I thought he’d be better.”

“Me too,” David said darkly.

“How’s your mom?”

David did nothing but wince. A rare look of real pain came to Iris’s face. “Oh muffin. No. What’s going on?”

“Let’s just say I won’t be making an It Gets Better video anytime soon. But honest, I’m doing real good; everything’s good. Work’s great. I came out there.”

“You’re kidding!”

“Nope. My boss was just like, ‘That’s cool.’ I guess he’s got a trans niece? I’ll take it, heh. I told them to keep calling me the same name and pronouns and everything, like I’m in no hurry. But I wear a dress there and nobody cares. Every now and then some drunk guy will say a thing and a regular will be like, ‘Chill, that’s just David.’ Sometimes they call me ‘David with the Tits.’ Funny life,” she said gamely.