Because the group chat was not a small thing, however small Zachary pretended it was.

It was the whole architecture of my place in that family, made visible.

He removed me from it whenever Tristan was cross, whenever his parents were displeased, whenever his ex-wife’s feelings were the least bit ruffled — as if my belonging were a privilege I had to keep re-earning, week after week, on good behavior.

And his ex-wife, divorced from him for six years, had never once been removed.

Not a single time.