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again.  
    Raven had been there through the whole thing, comforting her
through her crying bouts, helping to restore her shattered self-esteem. Dorian
was there for her, too, just in a different way. He’d threatened to kick
Jamal’s ass if he ever saw him again, which wasn’t likely to happen since he
moved with his new fiancé to Charlotte just a month after his graduation.
Dorian never liked Jamal and made no qualms about telling her.
    She glanced at the clock, noting she had about fifteen minutes to
finish getting ready. She still felt stupid every time she thought about Jamal,
even though it was five years ago. The whole story was so cliché it was
sickening, but it was her story. And it hurt. She wasn’t vulnerable very often.
She wouldn’t allow herself to be. She learned enough about what that got you from watching Chrissy and
seeing how her mom’s relationship with her dad had turned out.
    They’d divorced when she was ten. Her mom caught him cheating, and
he said he couldn’t be married anymore. A year later he was living in Reno,
married to some chick he’d only known for six weeks, helping her raise her
two-year-old daughter. She’d listened to her mom crying herself to sleep more
times than she cared to remember in the year that followed. Her crying hadn’t
gotten her anything either. Her dad never came back.
    Suffice to say, she wasn’t big on the dating scene. She’d gone out
a few times, but had deliberately kept it casual. Besides, she had other things
to focus on—like her career. She wasn’t an idiot. She knew music
journalism was competitive, especially if you were a woman. She also knew that
there was a good chance UMusic wouldn’t
last much longer and she needed to build her clips and establish herself more
if she planned on eventually landing another gig. She didn’t have time for the
endless drama that came with being in a relationship or seriously dealing with
a guy. Yes, she got lonely at times. But she could deal with it. If it got
unbearable, she’d call up one of the guys she’d hang with occasionally, usually
Amari.
    She liked hanging with him the most because he didn’t bug her. He
didn’t call often; she usually called him. He didn’t harass her by pretending
to want to be in a relationship with her. He was upfront about not wanting one,
which suited her just fine. And mostly, he didn’t push her about having sex.
She knew most guys expected it after two to three dates, which sadly, ended up
being her cut-off frame as a result. Amari seemed to be okay with just hanging
out with her. She wasn’t naïve though. She knew that if she ever initiated it
he would immediately accept. He flirted with her endlessly when they were
together, but that’s as far as it went. And she never felt creeped out by his
advances because she knew they were harmless. They understood each other. And
it worked.
      Of course, Raven
thought she was avoiding a serious relationship because she was scared of
getting hurt again. Destiny was honest enough to admit that was part of it, but
mostly she just had other shit to be concerned about.
    Her phone buzzed and she rushed out of the bathroom and grabbed it
off of the desk, grinning as she read the text Brian had just sent.
    “ Make sure you check out
Reflux Jazz tonight if you can. I saw them a couple of months ago and they’re
dope.”
    “Already on the agenda,” she responded.
    “Cool. Exclamation point.”
    She smiled and sat the phone back on the desk and rifled through
her suitcase, trying to find something comfortable for the night. She didn’t
know if she would see him again before he left for Phoenix. His flight was
leaving first thing in the morning and she knew she wasn’t going to be finished
until really late. She was tempted to persuade him to get a pass to the
Festival, but his new bosses wanted him to go to dinner with them to meet with
some clients.
    She slid into a pair of jeans and pulled a red Bob Marley tank top
over her