“I’m in Boston,” I said. “I took it back.”
A pause.
Then I heard her slowly breathe out.
“Good girl,” she said, her voice thick. “Good for you, Emily.”
That evening at a conference dinner, a twenty-six-year-old program coordinator named Tess lingered after everyone else left.
She twisted her napkin and quietly asked if she could get my advice about something “hypothetical.”
Her hypothetical involved a boyfriend.
A phone he kept face-down.
A suspicious weekend trip.
Chapter 16
I recognized the look on her face.
The look of someone standing in a crowded place with a bag about to slip from her hand.
“Don’t react yet,” I said. “Not to him, and not to anyone. Just learn where you stand first. Quietly. And know that whatever you find, you’re not crazy, and you’re not alone.”
She stared at me.
Then nodded, eyes bright.
I had only passed along what had been given to me.
But for the first time, I understood how it felt to be Margaret.
Spring became summer.
Life did what life does.
It kept going when I didn’t think it would.
Daniel found a small apartment near his office and, to his credit, stayed in therapy.
In June, I received a real paper letter from him.
His blocky handwriting covered the page.
One crossed-out line was still readable.
He wrote that Dr. Alvarez had helped him understand he had built his entire sense of worth around being needed and admired.
When that admiration cracked, he reached for whatever could patch it fastest.
He asked nothing from me.
He didn’t ask for forgiveness.
He wrote only:
