Grief for someone you were not supposed to love is a strange and lonely thing, because there is no place for it and no one to share it with.

When your grandmother dies, the world knows how to hold you; there are casseroles and cards and a chair reserved for you at the front of the room.

But there is no ritual, no recognized category, for the man who was paid to visit an old woman and made the mistake of loving her for real.

I could not tell anyone.

Who would I have told, and what would I have said?