It is about what actually holds power in any arrangement between people, and how thoroughly the visible signs of power can mislead you about where it truly sits.

Flynn had all the visible signs.

He had the title, the corner office, the name on the tower, the interviews, the reputation as a self-made man; by every marker our world uses to read power, he was powerful and I was decoration.

And all of it was borrowed.

Every marker he wore was a thing I owned and had lent him, and he had come to mistake the wearing for the owning so completely that he could send his wife a message saying she had nothing, from inside a building she held the deed to.

This is the great illusion that lets the Flynns of the world operate: that the person standing in the light is the person who holds the power, and the quiet one in the background is a subordinate.