“Okay,” she says. “You just seemed really happy when you were painting, is all.”

I’m thankful when we finally find a parking spot and can walk into the openness of the park. There’s a couple of Hang-Out groups tossing Frisbees and drinking beers.

“Wow, it’s beautiful here,” Katie says as we sit on the grass. She looks around at the people sunbathing and a group of guys kicking a soccer ball back and forth. “I feel like I’d come here every day if I lived in the city.”

“That’s what I thought, too. I haven’t been here in years.” My phone dings. The three guys playing soccer want to gangbang me.

“Okay, seriously, what’s up with your phone?”

“Firestarter,” I say.

Katie’s never heard of it, so I show her the app, tell her how easy it is to create a profile, explain how it could’ve helped her during her lonely period. “There’s check boxes for everything from bondage to group sex,” I tell her, but Katie doesn’t reply, she’s just scrolling through the men. “Most of the guys you’re looking at spent their teenage years jerking off to facials, so you have to check that box or you just end up with a bunch of old dudes pretending to be gentlemanly. Sure enough, when they’re ready to come, they all want facials!” I say, and laugh. I’ve given that monologue a dozen times at Hang-Out events, and whenever I do, the women will be cracking up or nodding their heads and telling me to preach. But Katie’s just sitting there, looking at me like I told her I drowned a bag of kittens.

“What?” I finally ask.

She lifts the screen to show me a penis with a smiley face drawn on it in Sharpie. “This is what you do for a living? You edit these?”

“Not that site, it’s another one called Aphrodite. I can show you.”

“It’s just…” She looks at the photo of the smiley-face penis again. “It’s sick. I mean, can’t you close down your account?”

“And do what? Talk to these guys?” I gesture to all the screen-cocked heads and thumb-typing sunbathers. “I’d have to ask them to take out their earbuds first.”

“Mandy, you can’t live like this.”

“Like what?”

“Like choosing positions as if you’re ordering pizza.”

“Jeez,” I say, taking back my phone. “I didn’t realize you were so sex-shamey. This is how people date now. You’ve just been upstate making blueberry jam.”

“I’ve been overcoming cancer.”

“Well, you lost track of how things are. People don’t talk and they don’t date. They fuck and get on with their lives. Trust me, it’s way easier that way.”

“But this isn’t how people are supposed to live. You need love. You need friendship.”

“I have friends,” I say, and I want to list off a dozen names to prove her wrong, but the only name I can come up with is Jeff’s.