A seagull flies close to the water, and I turn my neck slowly, following it along its path. We’re sitting on the grass at Hudson River Park. It’s the middle of the day, and the sun and the humidity are as strong as ever.

“Are you really gonna do it?” she asks me. “Are you gonna move to New Jersey?”

“I dunno,” I say. “I keep asking myself the same questions, over and over again: How could I do this? How could I stay?”

“Matt,” she says, staring deep into my eyes. “How could you go? This is where you need to be. If you want to do everything you said you would—get into Tisch and make it to Broadway, you have to stay.”

I look down, start playing with the grass. I haven’t told Kimmie that I’m not sure I want those things anymore—that what matters most now isn’t Tisch or Broadway, but figuring out what my new dreams will be. I need something different—something stable, something that would allow me to send money to my parents back in Mexico.

“There’s also Adam,” I say. “I feel like it would be such a waste to end things with him when they’ve barely even started. Is that stupid? Is it stupid that he’s part of the reason why I don’t want to go?”

Kimmie shakes her head. “It’s not. You deserve to see where things go with him. Besides, I’d like to think that it’s not just him. I’m also part of the reason why you don’t wanna go, right?”

I look up to see that she’s smiling. Letting out a small laugh, I say, “Yes, Kimmie. Of course you are.”

“Where are they, anyway? He and Darryl said they’d be here twenty minutes ago.”

I look down at my phone. I have a new text from Adam. “The subway was delayed,” I say, reading out loud. “He says they’ll be here soon.”

“Heya,” we hear Adam’s voice behind us suddenly.

I turn around to find that the two of them are walking toward us. Kimmie lets out a small sigh when she sees Darryl, but I only have eyes for Adam. His hair looks blond in the summer sun. His eyes are bright, and his smile is bigger than ever. He sits down next to me on the grass and gives me a quick kiss on the lips, and just like that, everything feels right again.

We end up going to SoHo, and we do the same thing as always—we look for a place that doesn’t have security at the door, which isn’t hard to find in the middle of the day. Then Kimmie and I go wait in a corner while Adam and Darryl, who are the tallest and oldest-looking of the group, try to order at the bar.