Page 37 of Seven Days in June

“No, it was ‘Take my order or suck my dick,’” corrected Eva.

Belinda snorted. “So, why did you break up?”

“Doesn’t matter.” Eva waved her hand dismissively. “I’ve lived entire lifetimes since then.”

“This is a word.” Belinda crossed her legs, her gauzy palazzo pants billowing. “Men don’t define our journey. It’s about honoring our queendom. Vibrating at our divine plane.”

Cece rolled her eyes. “Relax, Badu.”

“When I think about it,which I never do,” started Eva, “I’m just shocked we got so intense so fast.”

“I felt passion like that once,” Belinda mused. “Remember Kai, the bouncer from that Bushwick hookah spot? He fucked the soul out of me one evening, and I turned over and wrote a sonnet called ‘Skyscrapers Penetrating the Night Sky.’”

“It ran in theParis Review!” said Eva. “I admire your ability to write about penises so lyrically. It’s a tricky body part to describe. One wrong adjective, and it’s a tumor.”

Belinda nudged Cece. “You ever experienced wild love?”

“Hmm.” She swirled her straw in her latte. “I’d die for my hairdresser. We’ve all seen what Lionel does with 4C hair.”

“You’d die for Lionel,” said Eva, “but not your husband of twenty years?”

Cece had known her terminally reserved plastic-surgeon husband, Ken, since preschool. His appearance suggested that God had struggled to remember what Billy Dee Williams looked like inMahogany, and had almost gotten it right. They were a perfect match. Spelman. Morehouse. AKA. Alpha. Their grandfathers had been best friends at Howard, class of ’46. What they lacked in passion, they made up for in obviousness.

“I adore Ken, but I’m not built for romantic passion. Men are such children. I just read an article about mainland China’s female shortage. Grown men are living alone in filthy houses and dying prematurely because there’s no women to make their doctor’s appointments.”

“Speaking of doctors,” said Belinda, “my gyno just performed a goddess ritual on my vagina. She steamed it, saged it, and then spoke wisdom into my crotch.”

“I wonder if my vagina’s wise,” mused Cece.

“Mine’s dumb as fuck, judging from her choices,” said Belinda.

Am I really laying my burdens at the feet of these Muppets?Eva wondered.

“I should go,” she said. But she just sat there, her face cloudy.

Belinda and Cece exchanged glances. There was more to Eva’s story. And they knew they’d never hear it.

These three knew each other’s pizza order at Roberta’s, shoe sizes, and favorite Spotify playlists. But Cece and Belinda knew nothing about Eva’s pre-Brooklyn life. She’d alluded to a nomadic childhood. But actual details? Throwback Thursday content? Forget it. She never traveled home for holidays. Wherewashome, even? Belinda and Cece didn’t know, but they respected Eva’s privacy. Mysterious pasts weren’t unusual for transplanted New Yorkers. Moving to New York was about reinvention. If you didn’t want that, you stayed in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

Once you crossed the Verrazzano Bridge, you were free to shed skin. The Dallas trust fundie became a Red Hook hipster. The Tennessee hillbilly became a well-married tastemaker. In New York, you were who you said you were.

Eva was private. But she was clearly struggling.

Cece pulled Eva into an embrace. Belinda hugged them both. Nearby, a PhD student glanced up from her laptop and snapped a pic for Instagram Stories (#Heartwarming #GirlPower #NeverthelessShePersisted).

“Back then, I felt defective,” she said, gently disentangling herself. “Like an alien. I was in so much pain, it burned through everything—my thoughts, my personality, my emotions, everything. Until Shane.”

“You met another alien,” surmised Cece.

“And the magic’s still there! What’s his sign?” Belinda googled his birthday on her phone.

“We never had magic,” lied Eva, swallowing a pain pill dry. “Just hormones. Honestly, you shouldn’t be allowed to have orgasms like that before you’re twenty-one. It gives you brain damage.”

“March thirtieth.” Belinda grimaced. “Damn, he’s an Aries. The thots of the zodiac.”

“Run,” advised Cece.

“Actually, you might need exposure therapy,” mused Belinda, nibbling on Eva’s untouched scone. “Spend a lot of time with him, until you’ve demystified his memory. Like when you eat fifteen doughnuts in one sitting to cure your sugar addiction.”

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