This time it was her sighing. “Yes, he did that, and he owned it. He’s also figuring out how to make it right.”

“What does that mean?” I blurted out, interrupting her.

“That’s for him to tell you, not me, Patrice. What I do have to tell you is this: you need to learn how to value the people in your life who are willing to put it all on the line for you. You’re self-righteous and you’re judgmental. You need to let go of some of that anger, P. Open your eyes and see that not everyone is out here trying to let you down. If you need to get some professional help to work some of that out do it, before you lose big.”

After my talk with Dr. Simons I felt that in my bones. “I know.”

Pri clicked her tongue, and when she spoke again she sounded a lot less pissed. “Patrice, I’ve known you since we were in elementary school. I have seen you harden, and I know, believe me, I know the world has given you plenty of reasons. I’m a woman of color trying to move up the ranks of the police department in New York. I fucking live in a space of barely contained frustration. But I can tell you this, my struggle will not get any easier by shutting out the people who hold it down when I need it. Are people going to stumble? Fuck yeah they will, there is so much bullshit to unlearn.”

The truth in her words were cutting me to the core. “You need to figure out why you believe that you don’t deserve to be happy.”

“I never said I don’t deserve to be happy, I just don’t want to betray myself.” I wasn’t sure that was true, because almost at every opportunity I’d tried to minimize how much I felt for Easton.

“You need to stop seeing your happiness like foreboding.”

Did I do that?

“Well that’s not a switch I can just turn off, Priscilla.” This conversation had me completely out of my depth.

“Do you really think that’s what Easton expected? That you would fall in love with his dick and all of a sudden you’d drop the ‘I’m an island’ flow you’ve been rocking for the last thirty-four years?”

She had to make me laugh. “I’m not sure why I thought calling you instead of Camilo would somehow mean I didn’t get my ass handed to me.”

She snorted a laugh and I could almost hear the eye roll. “Because you’re a fool.” The sigh she let out then, told me that the jokes were over.