“I spent the day running errands,” I said, peering down at my sweatshirt, jeans and J’s combo. “This is perfectly fine.”

She shook her head like I was a very lovable but completely lost cause. “But you’re a professor now. Why spend hundreds of dollars on tennis shoes? If you’re going to spend your money, buy something nice.”

I threw my hands up, laughing. “These shoes are nice and I don’t need to wear suits all the time! I promise I don’t teach in these clothes.”

She adopted the mischievous look that in my childhood had always been the prelude to something that would either mortify me or delight me. I could never tell.

“Maybe I should start asking for OOTD selfies.”

I did bust up at that. “Manman, where did you hear about that?” I said, grinning at how pleased with herself she looked for throwing “outfit of the day” at me.

“You know I got my fashion sense from you. I’m not showing up in class looking like a scrub.” She gave me a look like she wasn’t convinced in the slightest that I wasn’t going to show up to class in some Tims.

I had to distract her with something, or this was going to end with her forcing me to go shopping with her. “How’s business? You said you’re expanding?”

She immediately perked up at that. My mom was the OG hustler. She’d started her own business when I was finishing high school and was always on the move trying to take it to the next level.

She looked over at me, her face open and smiling, and I could tell she had a lot of updates. “Your Manman is now officially working in the Westchester courts,” she said, snapping her finger. “So far we’ve gotten a lot of business, there are lots of Caribbean people moving up here, so our court interpreters are getting a lot of work.”

“Of course you are.” I grinned, so proud of her. She’d worked on that expansion for two years. “You always know when to make your next move. Did you hire more people?”