The dark-haired woman who’s come to get me introduces herself as Ivonne, my first contact with Make It Happyn, and she is as bold and vibrant in person as her voice was on the phone. Her summery dress is patterned all over with bright pink flowers; her high heels—which add four inches to her petite frame—match. She seems thrilled to finally meet me, and I get a jolt of you-don’t-have-to-visualize-it confidence.

And the mood in the conference room is similarly welcoming. I miss the natural light of the shop, miss being surrounded by my friends and the beautiful, comforting tools of my trade, but the team is talkative as I set up, all of them complimenting me on my work, my social media. Within minutes my originals are spread out on the table, each one covered with a matte black sheet of paper, which I’ll ask members of the team to reveal as I move through the presentation I’ll be projecting on the screen. The scans are good, but it’s not the same as seeing them on paper.

And then I begin.

I do it exactly as I rehearsed yesterday, introducing myself and my city walk-inspired pitch. I start with the vintage-inspired treatment, lettering for the headers like old signs, the colors muted and sometimes patchy, a faded effect that took forever to get exactly right. Then the trees—my lovely, gorgeous trees—branches and leaves growing across the pages, complemented by small, simple serifs that don’t steal the focus. The final reveal is my favorite, my most recent addition, designed and refined over the last two weeks or so, when Reid’s long hours had me longing for those not-too-warm spring days of walking. Each month a secret, subtle tribute to a different neighborhood we’d walked together, lettering inspired by its architecture or its attitude, lightly drawn lines linking one page to the next, as though they are train routes or street grids on a map. Maybe you’d see it if you knew New York, maybe you wouldn’t. But every page is unique, and each time you turn one, you feel as if you’ve genuinely moved. You’re in a whole new place, but somehow, you’re still in the same general space.

When I did this pitch in front of Cecelia, Lachelle, and Lark, their faces had been a blend of pride and awe, big oohs and aahs when I’d change the slide, when I’d cue them to reveal a sketch. Cecelia, in particular, had wiped her eyes when I finished, had told me how proud she was of how much I’d grown, how much my art had developed.