Page 78 of Love at a Funeral and Other Awkward Conversations

I gasp audibly as my hand clutches at my chest. He’s right. I’ve been using him this whole time. “I’m sorry,” I say quietly over my shoulder. “I told you, I’m no good for you.”

He pulls up short in his tracks, giving me the space I said I wanted. “Fine! Run away! That’s one thing you’re good at!”

It’s true. I’m a coward and deserve every bit of the physical ache between my ribs, but it’s better this way.

CHAPTER 28

After a sleepless night, I escape to the city that never sleeps. Vince accused me of running away, but he’s only half right. I’m running away from him, from my family, but toward my old life. It may not have been perfect, but it wasn’t shrouded in pain, and that’s all I want. A moment, a place, that’s mine.

The brakes of the train hiss, and I follow the morning New Jersey Transit crowd out the doors to the platform in Penn Station. I fire off a few I’m in town, what are you up to? texts to some of my old friends. No one but Alma responds, my roommate from Columbia. I’m working late tonight.

Call out, I message back, to which she replies with the side-eye emoji.

Come on, I could always count on you for day drinking, I text before purchasing a new Metro card since I lost mine ages ago. While I wait for the downtown line, I use social media to check in on people I used to hang out with. Unfortunately, unlike the gross, humid underground air, a lot has changed. Geoff moved to Los Angeles to work for Jay-Z’s music service. He even got to meet Beyoncé. Tasha married her boyfriend, got pregnant, and is living in Syracuse. And Alma, the ultimate commitment-phobe, apparently has a live-in girlfriend.

Sorry, Alma finally texts back. A sweating face and champagne bottle follow. Maybe we can catch up another day! Have fun!

I’d been hoping I’d be able to rediscover my old life, footloose and fancy free, broke and bone-weary. Even though it wasn’t much different from my current life, at least I was living in the greatest city in the world.

I could try again, move back here. I have a little bit of money saved. I could find a job, hopefully not in the service industry. I could…

I sigh. The thought of getting my life together is daunting. Months ago, I thought I had a chance. I had a plan, sort of, but that burned up with the embers of my family.

So, with nothing to lose now, I open my phone, finally reading the message from Professor Row.

Cassandra,

I’m happy to hear from you but so sorry you’re going through such a difficult time. I find that when the world seems to be out of control, I focus on my work. It rights me, gives me a purpose, a sense of self. It sounds the same for you as well.

Regarding your idea for a manuscript, it is intriguing. I’d love to hear more about it. I have always adored your voice, and it would be my pleasure to read more of it.

As you know, job openings in journalism are few and far between, and I don’t know of any internships right now. Of course, I will keep my ears open for anything. In the meantime, work on your book. It seems to me that is what is in your heart.

Please keep me updated on it!

The tiny bit of hope I held is extinguished, and I breathe out a curse, deleting the email thread. I can’t think about the book right now or how my one talent is almost impossible to make any money from.

So much for moving to New York.

I need a new place, a cheap place like Nebraska or a tiny boat on the ocean. But more immediately, I need to drown my sorrows at my favorite bar.

After hopping onto the train car, I catch some guy staring at me and scowl at him before moving closer to the door, but it’s a long ride to Brooklyn, and I eventually bite the bullet, taking a seat opposite him. He continues to leer at me. How easily I forgot about the subway creeps when I didn’t have to deal with them every day.

When the train stops at Grand Avenue, I hop off, almost smiling to myself at the familiarity of it. The smell—that weird smell you can only find in the city, as if the concrete is sweating. The whir of bicyclists as they pass, the voices of people all around, the honks and beeps of cars, it’s all the same. But Bushwick looks quite a bit different. It’s gentrified, more than when I left. I pass my old apartment building, which is cleaned up, new windows, a tiny garden where the patch of dirt used to be, and no Dominican flag hanging out of the third-floor window.

I hum disappointedly to myself as I resume the walk to my old haunt, a dive bar where Marissa and I always hung out. Marissa’s brother owned the bar where you could order a shot of cheap tequila and a beer for five bucks and the jukebox in the corner only played Gloria Estefan. Marissa was an artist, made a small living from selling abstract art to rich, hip couples in Tribeca, but she also dealt on the side, and if there was ever a time I needed a smoke, it is now. I turn the corner off Knickerbocker to where Mis Tíos used to be.

My mouth gapes open at the storefront in its place. The sign reads Branch in big wooden letters above a smaller plank that declares it’s an olive oil and vinegar shop. I reach for the long bronze handle and open the thick glass doors. The scents of fresh bread and herbs waft over me.

A petite blonde with pale skin smiles at me from behind the counter. “Hi, how can I help you?”

“How long has this place been open?” I ask, pointing to the floor.

She squints in thought. “Um, a little over a year. This your first time here? Can I interest you in a sample of anything?”

“No,” I say as she hurries around the counter with her arm out as if to escort me over to the large glass apothecary jars of dark vinegar. My tone stops her. “Do you know what happened to Felix? The guy who used to own the bar here?”

“Sorry, no.” She sweeps her hand over to a bottle of olive oil. “But we have a new blood-orange-infused oil, if you’re interested.”

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