Dear primo,

I'm sorry to say but it was bound to happen. Your relationship began over ice creams on pearl beaches during her exciting summer abroad. To her, your daily backyard was all glamorous palm trees, a welcome escape from her suburban Connecticut town. You were exotic, her shiny love she could later parade around Ivy League parties. You weren't just her boyfriend, but her "Boyfriend, from the Dominican Republic." I cringed every time I heard her introduce you in that way. Her friends greeted you with wide-eyed smiles and dismissed your silence and barely-touched drinks because being international automatically made you cool.  But primo, you're so much more than where you came from. You're so much more than an inspiring story that molds so perfectly into the American dream. Her love should have offered you more than English lessons, suits, and fancy dinners. After all, love is more than someone's else's idea of you and of what you can become. I know it was easy for you to get caught up in the privileged spaces she laid out for you, spaces that the rest of our family have yet to break into. She made everything seem so easy, so comfortable, so convenient. But things aren't easy here, primo, and now that she's gone you'll learn that those spaces were never intended for you. But your family is still here for you. We know you're more than just some cocktail conversation a girl will use whenever someone mentions the Dominican Republic. We know what it's like to have this country make you feel like you're flying only to then bring you to your knees. Decades we've spent here and we no longer buckle under its weight. She's gone, primo, but don't feel ashamed. Come back to us and we'll show you how we keep ourselves standing on our own two feet.