Her dissertation wasn’t perfect, but her committee believed in the cheesy adage that “the best dissertation is a done dissertation,” and they believed in her and her work. She’d walked out of her dissertation defense certain that she had a damn good basis for that groundbreaking book she knew she was writing. Nearly three years later, she couldn’t even fathom what had made her think that at the time. When she looked at her dissertation now, all she could see were flaws she didn’t know how to fix and holes in the research she didn’t have the expertise to fill, and it made her want to cry.

Toni would have said she’d developed a phobia about her research, and she needed to see a therapist about it and talk to her mentors. Marie would have agreed but then reminded them of the last time they’d all tried to find local, culturally sensitive therapists covered under their insurance. Then they’d all be sad.

Deja knew Toni was right, but she had no idea how to scale the wall she’d mentally built between herself and her writing, and her current coping mechanism for it was to just run away. The only problem was that with her third-year review looming, she didn’t have anywhere else to run. When she turned in her portfolio next fall, she needed to be able to say that she’d made some progress with her book and had at least a couple of articles under review at journals in her field.

Her phone rang.

She thought she’d put it on do not disturb, but apparently, that was yet another thing at which she’d failed. Her low self-esteem didn’t care that it was an accident. She grabbed her phone from the desk as a new self-loathing mixed with her insecurity briefly before dissipating when she saw Alejandro’s name.

“Hi,” she breathed into the phone.

“Hi,” he breathed back.

In the background of his call, Deja heard what sounded like a party and then the click of a door closing and then quiet.

“Are you busy?” he asked.

Deja’s eyes skittered to her laptop. The answer was yes. She should have said yes. She knew that, but she silently pressed her laptop closed. “Nope,” she said. “What’s up?”

It sounded like he sighed, and Deja was certain that she could hear a smile in his voice. Or maybe she just wanted to hear that. “I needed to hear your voice.”

“Yeah?” she asked.

“Definitely. I miss you.”

Deja had to bite the inside of her cheek for a bit to stop from screaming. This man couldn’t be real. “I miss you, too,” she mumbled.

“How much?”

“What does that question mean?” she asked with a laugh.

“What are you wearing?”

“Really?”