When a friend dies and you cannot say his name, cannot say how, cannot say what he did or why it mattered, you carry the whole weight of him in silence, and the people at your own dinner table look at the plain band of steel on your wrist and think, if they think anything at all, that you have poor taste.

I had spent twelve years being quietly misjudged by my family at every turn, and every misjudgment was a small price I paid on purpose, and the prices had added up over the years to something large.

They thought I was unambitious.

I was decorated.

They thought I was passive.

I had made decisions in rooms they will never hear about that they could not survive being told.