There was also the time she called me (and woke me up) in the middle of the night because her ankle hurt, and she thought it might be a blood clot. It takes her twenty minutes longer than it should to drive to my house because merging gives her heart palpitations, so she avoids freeways whenever possible. She also hates underground parking garages because we live in the Bay Area and if the “big one” finally happens, then she doesn’t want to be trapped in her car beneath slabs of concrete when it hits. This means Wes and I are often left waiting at restaurants, making awkward small talk, while she circles the block, trying to find aboveground parking.

She is a bundle of nerves and anxieties and worst-case-scenario what-ifs. I am pretty sure this is an unfortunate side effect of living a blessed life and being born with the active imagination of a writer, but let’s examine the former for now. Parisa is the product of successful parents whose wealth is a result of the tech boom. She lives in a gorgeous house in Los Gatos, a five-minute walk from Great Bear Coffee and restaurants that I will never, ever be able to afford to step foot in, like Le Papillon and Manresa.

I think her life of privilege has her convinced that something horrible will happen someday and she’ll lose everything. To use a football analogy (go, Niners!), my sweet, beautiful best friend lives her life on defense. She is so convinced she’s going to get hit, she spends all her time preparing herself for the inevitable blows, so they’ll hurt a little less if and when they happen. The rest of us are innocent bystanders to her catastrophic tendencies. I’m not gonna lie—it can be really inconvenient sometimes.

I give her a hug like I always do when she’s freaking out, but this just makes her body go rigid. She asks me to get her parents, and when I don’t, she pulls away from me and starts screaming for them. Fuck shit fuck. I clasp my hand over her mouth, but it’s too late. Before I can convince her to calm down, her mom and dad are frantically knocking on the bathroom door. Who could blame them? Based on the way she’s yelling, they probably think we’re being murdered by a pair of escaped convicts from San Quentin who’ve broken into the house. I want to be mad at her, but it’s impossible. I can tell she’s terrified, and plus, what if this is the one time she’s right? What if she’s the girl who cried death, but this time she really kicks the bucket? What if this is the blow she’s been bracing for her whole life? Now my heart starts to race. I hop out of the tub and open the door.