It was not the cruelty of strangers.

It was the careful, well-mannered avoidance of people who knew.

Every one of them had heard Kingston’s version — the brave reinvention, the difficult ex-wife — and not one of them had ever heard mine, and now here I was in the flesh, an inconvenient reminder that the charming man at the head table had a first family he had discarded, and the kindest thing they could think to do was pretend not to see me.

A woman I had hosted for dinner twice gave me a small tight smile and then found something fascinating in her napkin.

A man Kingston had mentored looked through me as though I were a coat rack.

I understood it, even.