MY MOM'S UBER slowed to a progressive stop outside The Hub, and I flexed my fingers in the pockets of my bomber jacket to ward off some more of my tightly wound nerves. The Hub was an Afrocentric café slash lounge slash club, depending on the time of day, and the rhythm of Monaky's The Suitor eddied beneath the pavement in the humid Boston afternoon.

My mom had gotten her hair curled sometime between the last time we saw each other and now, a surprising change from her usual headscarfs, and it fell in shiny locks all around her face. Her skin was a shade darker than mine, but if I wasn't mistaken, it held a glow that had been carefully tucked away for the longest time. It hadn't been easy for any of us since my dad figured his marriage wasn't worth the effort anymore, but my mom had, naturally, received the brunt of it.

In Nigerian society, marriage held a great deal of value. Weddings were mostly elaborate and colorful, and usually required the participation of more family members than people knew they had. For some women, it was an achievement. Since the society still retained a lot of its cultural influences, we had two—or, in some cases, more—marital ceremonies over the span of a couple of days. The people expected forever to be the deal. Hence, divorce was greatly frowned upon. It was like wrapping yourself in marital shame.

My maternal grandparents didn't think a married couple separating after four years together and two children because they weren't "seeing eye to eye anymore" made any sense. It was a flimsy excuse made by a man who wasn't ready to take responsibility, a man whose only wish was to waste their daughter's time, a man who didn't understand that you didn't just divorce a Nigerian woman. They resented him for it. In the years that followed, my mom's cheeks hollowed out, and dark creases found home beneath her eyes. She lost weight and took on long shifts at work.

I saw her less every year.

But today, she looked like she could be happy. Maybe somewhere in an alternate dimension, the man she loved enough to move overseas for never broke her heart. Maybe they had two daughters, one year apart, that they both cherished. Or maybe they had no children. But I chose to entertain the possibility that they were happy. Individually, and as a unit. Maybe she wasn't fractured. Maybe she'd never be, and in turn, neither would I.

I watched her get out of the silver Prius, then averted my gaze to the restaurant across the street while she pushed the door shut, because I wasn't quite ready to bear the reality of this lifetime all over again. A gust of warm breeze hit my face as the Prius drove by, and I took the next few seconds to draw in deep, measured breaths.

"You lost weight," was the first thing she said to me, and I cracked a smile at the way she enunciated her Ts.

"It's college, Mom," I responded, finally meeting her eyes. "I think it's supposed to make you lose some weight."

"I think that's just an excuse. Tomi started university and put on ten pounds. Besides, you looked much better the last time I paid you a visit."

I felt my smile go weak, before I looked down to clean phantom dirt from beneath my nails. "Well. Tomi's in USC, and home is less than an hour away from USC." I shoved my hands back in my pockets. "Also, we're not the same person."

Contrary to what I was expecting, my mom didn't speak. For a while. Instead, she stood still and kept her intent gaze on me. For a few seconds, I thought about the color of her eyes to distract myself. When the sun hit right, they were the color of melted sugar, with a dark brown ring that pulled the whole thing together. I recalled how often I used to wonder if anyone would ever be as transfixed by my eyes, before finding out that mine were more light brown and didn't have as much talent in the sunlight. Like my dad's.

Several beats later, we still stood there, and I replayed my tone in my head, checked for faults, errors. There was genuinely nothing scarier than a Nigerian mother's sudden silence.

Finally, a corner of her lips twitched. "Have you been taking your medication?"

"Mom, can we not do this right now?" My voice was sharp, and even though I meant what I said as a polite request to not talk about my health on a semi-busy Boston sidewalk on a Friday afternoon, it came out sounding more like an order. In my head, I could hear her say, "I'll fix that attitude of yours with a dirty slap" the same way she did every time she felt Tomi and I were being too American for our own good.

When she spoke again, her sentence caught me off guard. "I thought children hug their mothers when they see them."

I blew out a quiet breath, then made to close the distance between us. When I was maybe six or seven years old, she'd sit me on our porch and braid my hair into fat cornrows while Tomi drew disfigured people on the driveway with chalk. After my hair was made, she'd take my face in her hands and give my cheeks a little squeeze. As her slender arms wrapped around me in a firm hug, that was the memory that played in my mind. There was a dull ache starting to take space in my chest, but it wasn't nostalgia. Felt more like grief, even though I wasn't sure what exactly I was grieving.

I placed my elbows on the countertop and interlocked my fingers as I wondered if I was supposed to wait my nonexistent turn to order, or just take any chance I got to grab the attention of the tattooed man behind the counter. I'd only been here a handful of times, and it was usually in the mornings, when I was one of four customers. I wasn't supposed to drink coffee, so my usual order was a breakfast sandwich and a virgin strawberry daiquiri. It was easier for me to drink a mocktail in the morning, in public, when the actual public wasn't there.

The song playing changed, and as the first lines of Ruin by USHER and Pheelz came in, a big hand appeared next to my left elbow. I noticed the pretty shape of the neatly trimmed fingernails first, then the silver ring around the index finger, then the simple yet elegant matching bracelet around the wrist. My heart flew into my mouth at the sight of the veins that bulged gently beneath the skin.

I looked up at Jason at the same time that he looked at me, and for the first time since I met him, he didn't greet me with a smile. His rich brown gaze was mostly blank and unexcited, and he offered me a small chin nod before redirecting his attention to the bartender. He'd redone his twin braids, and I briefly wondered about his hair care routine. The tips of his braids curled and held some weight, an indicator that he embraced natural hair care. For hair as voluminous as his was, it was enviable.

I didn't realize I was staring at him until he looked back at me. This time, a hint of mischief sparkled in his eyes.

"Haven't had your caffeine today?" I heard from my mouth, and it was worth noting that I didn't exactly mind that he caught me staring.

The corner of his lips twitched. "Woke up wrong, more like." His voice was a few octaves deeper than it usually was in the daytime, and it gave me the impression that he hadn't used it much.

I put more of my weight on my arms. "Didn't know you were capable of waking up wrong."

His face fell, and once again, his attention was back on the bartender. I felt a brush of . . . something when he said, "Sorry to disappoint."

Against my will, I recalled that this was similar to what happened at the clinic, and in turn, I remembered Sydney freaking Miller.

"How are you?"

For a moment, Jace was quiet, and I couldn't tell if he was genuinely thinking about a response, or if he just didn't want to give me an answer. I realized I was watching him again when his jaw pulsed.

There was something intense about Jason's presence. He was maybe 6'3", with shoulders that were a result of a harmonious combination of genes and the gym. His jaw was strong, his gaze was as profound as it was daring, and his smile always created a sort of ripple at the base of my stomach. His scent was heady yet soft. He didn't leave obvious beats in conversations, almost as though he had perfect, automated answers waiting.

But today, there was something less commandeering about that same presence, like he was actively trying not to take up too much space. It was something to be concerned about.

He reached up to scratch at the neckline of his black oversized sweatshirt, and his necklace peeked out from beneath it. I noticed that one in my freshman year, when I walked past the court in the middle of a shirt change.

When I thought about it, I realized I couldn't remember the exact moment we met. I knew it was through Sydney, and I knew Sydney made a comment about their friendship breaking social order—they both went to high school together, but Jace was a senior when he was a sophomore—but that was about it.

"I'm aight," he eventually said.

I took a moment to nod. "That was very unconvincing, though."

"Well."

"Jason Rivera is never unconvincing."

To my surprise, he smiled, then leaned down to mimic my posture. Then he really met my eyes, that smile still playing on his lips. They looked supple . . . and I was looking at his lips. I reconnected our gazes with a violent skip of my heartbeat.

If he noticed, he didn't act like he did. Instead, he said, "And you're both defensive and persistent."

"It's a difficult role to keep up with, trust me."

"Mm. How are you?"

I felt a smile on my lips at his question. "You're digressing."

His voice dropped to something quieter as he said, "So are you."

We maintained eye contact for a moment, then I realized I was making eye contact and tried to focus on spots around his face, but he didn't stop looking at me, and I was forced to very slowly accept the dare. For the next couple of seconds, all we did was observe each other. First person to back down was a rotten egg. It was unspoken, but it lingered in the space between us as Ruin continued to play through the speakers. A burning heat pooled behind my sternum the longer he entertained this dance, and I was about to look away when he blinked. Just like that, whatever had been stirring there dissipated.

"It's my birthday today," he told me, still quiet.

I felt my eyebrows furrow. "You're joking."

"Nope. Officially twenty-two."

"That's great! Why the long face, then?"

He looked down at his fingers and proceeded to toy with his ring. "Birthdays are either a time to celebrate, or a time to think about your existence. It's been a recurring crisis for me since I turned nineteen."

I wasn't expecting his honesty, and it took me a second to digest it. I wasn't sure how to respond, or if to respond. I envied people who always seemed to know what to say.

After a beat too long in silence, I settled on, "You're figuring things out, Jason. I think it's okay to still be figuring things out."

He nodded, his touch on his ring more absentminded now.

"You don't have to answer this, but what are you grateful for?"

Once again, he looked at me. "I don't have to answer that, yeah?"

I offered him a smile, and he smiled back. "You don't. I don't mean to sound motivational—and feel free to walk away if it gets too cringe for your liking—but a lot of the time, I think we're just too focused on what we don't know and what we don't have to notice the things we do know, and the things we do have. It may not be a lot, but at least it's something. We have to find something to keep us going, even if it's the color of our moms' eyes." As my sentence drew to an end, self-consciousness stepped in, and I wondered if I was making any sense, or being too personal. To battle that doubt, I asked, "Don't you think so?"

Jace didn't respond immediately, but his smile remained intact. I was worried for a second that it had become mocking, and was about to start berating myself for saying all those things that he didn't ask for when he said, "I mean, I do love the color of my mom's eyes."

Out of relief, I laughed. "So yeah. I can relate. But today is for you to celebrate who you are, so please if you see me anywhere else today, I want you to yell, "Yo, De" like you mean it."

At my impression of him, he laughed, and the gesture brightened up his face in an instant. I felt accomplished, and couldn't stop the smile that spread across my face.

"So you graduate next summer?"

He chuckled and scratched the side of his neck. "In three summers, actually. I major in pharmacy, so six years."

My lips parted in surprise, and after one look at my face, he laughed again. "Wow."

"I know. It's a lot."

"Yeah. It is. But it's great though. Really. I appreciate people in health."

"Thanks, De."

"Also, I'm sorry about the insensitive comment I made earlier. About the waking up wrong thing. I just don't really know how to talk to people."

"Nah, it wasn't insensitive. Just wrong timing for our usual flow. Thanks for talking to me."

"I'm only being nice to you because it's your birthday, just so you know. Back to our usual programming tomorrow."

Yet again, he laughed. "Aight. Noted." He took a glance at the bartender. "What do you wanna order?"

It was then that I remembered my mom was seated at a table in the corner. And she was most likely watching me converse with a boy when I was supposed to be spending time with her. I was so dead.

"I'll only tell you if you promise to let me pay for whatever you order," I told him.

"I'll only promise if you promise to let me pay for whatever you order."

"The grilled egg sauce sandwich trio and two fruit parfaits, thank you."

"Plantain chip nachos to go, thank you."

I widened my smile. "Happy birthday, Jason."

This time when he held my gaze, a flicker passed behind his eyes, and his smile fell into something softer. Something a little more disarming. The emotion in his eyes was gone before I could put a name to it, and he said, quietly, "Thank you, Désiré."

He'd never said my full name before.

(insert melting emoji)

that's it. that's the author's note.