Excerpt: An Interlude

Two weeks later, I was carrying a box up two flights of stairs to Marcus’s downtown apartment. I had made my decision. I would not retake the bar exam. And it was not because I had failed the first time; rather, it was because I had realized what a blessing my failure was, that now I wouldn’t have to pretend to be passionate about something as boring as divorce law.

My new bedroom faced the street. The windows were thin, so it was a bit loud, but after living in the old, crochety part of New Haven, it was welcome bustle. It was Marcus’s furniture in the room, so it had stayed after Garrett had left. I hadn’t yet gotten the specifics of Garrett’s exit, but it sounded like it had come to an easy, inevitable end.

“Only three more boxes,” Marcus said, entering the room behind me. He set down a box of my favorite books and gasped for air. It was a warm November day and the sunlight danced on the yellow walls of my new bedroom. I had announced just two days before that I was moving out of my parents’ mansion and into Marcus’s apartment. My parents, I think, were still in a state of shock; they hadn’t said much to me, but, knowing them, their pride would interfere with their actually missing me.