“I’m just thinking like a businesswoman,” I say. “I don’t have time to be nice—the VCs certainly won’t be.”

We turn onto a main road, and there are a few cars, so we have to ride one behind the other in the bike lane.

He doesn’t say anything for the rest of the ride.

We arrive at a cute little shop with a neon pink doughnut sign, the only place in town still open on a weekday at this hour. As we lock our bikes, I see people through the window. Rowdy college students who have pulled way too many chairs up to one table and tired-looking middle-aged people in various uniforms, clearly night shift workers on a break.

A soft bell rings as we enter. An impossibly-cheerful-for-the-time girl in a pink apron greets us at the counter and takes our order with a feathered pen. I assumed we would get one doughnut each, but Robbie insists we share a half dozen.

“You can’t just have one doughnut,” he says. He turns to the cashier.

“Tell her.”

“That’s true.” She nods seriously, blinking her heavily lined eyes.

We settle into a booth and Robbie sets down the box in front of me. My eyes go wide as I open it and examine our bounty. There are two chocolate-frosted doughnuts with rainbow sprinkles, one with no hole that’s filled with frosting, a plain glazed, a half-chocolate-dipped glazed, and one with peanuts on the outside.

I carefully remove a chocolate sprinkle doughnut and take a bite. “Mmmmmm.” I close my eyes. “This is heavenly.” I lick the sugary frosting on my lips.

Robbie nods as he bites into the peanut one.

“You know...” I say. “My mom would kill me if she knew I was eating this.” I rip off another bite. “She never let me have doughnuts as a kid. She was all about ‘breakfast is the most important meal of the day it has to be healthy blah blah blah.’” I take another bite and consider which doughnut I will have next. “I was always sooo jealous of the kids at school whose parents would buy sugary cereal and all that.” I take another bite and keep speaking, even with my mouth full. If I’m breaking one rule, I might as well be a full-on wild child. “And she still tries to micromanage my diet, calling to ask what I ate in the dining hall and so on.”

Robbie is quietly eating his doughnut, and I realize that I’ve been rambling, something I do that I hate. “How about you?” I ask. “Is your mom like that?”