I did not respond.
Then, one rainy Thursday in November, Ivy showed up at my office.
No appointment. No warning. Somehow security let her through, probably because grief has a face people feel guilty interrupting.
She stood in the doorway while I finished a call with London. Beige coat, no makeup, eyes ringed with the kind of exhaustion that comes from finally seeing your own life without decorative lighting.
When I ended the call, she sat down across from my desk and looked out at the city.
“I didn’t know where else to go,” she said.
I said nothing.
“It’s over,” she whispered. “Completely.”
I waited.
“After the annulment, Logan got mean. Really mean. He blamed me for everything. Said I humiliated him. Like I was the one who built lies into his whole life.”
