The way Quinn said it. Perfectly polite, perfectly professional, but with this undertone that made it clear she knew exactly who Lena was and exactly what she'd done.
Lena didn't shake her hand.
"I need to talk to Peter alone," Lena said.
"That's up to Peter," Quinn replied calmly.
I finally found my voice.
"Lena, I don't know what you thought would happen by coming here, but we don't have anything to talk about. I've moved on. You should, too."
"Moved on?" Her voice got louder. "It's been 4 months. 4 months, and you won't even talk to me? After 2 years together, you owe me at least a conversation. How can you be this heartless?"
This is when Quinn turned to Lena and said, very calmly, "This man isn't heartless. He just chooses to put his effort toward people who actually value it. You spent months making him feel like he was being unreasonable for wanting basic respect in his own relationship. He didn't owe you an explanation then, and he certainly doesn't owe you one now."
Lena's face went red. She looked at me.
"This is who you replaced me with? Some corporate b**** who doesn't even know what we had?"
"Okay, we're done here," I said. "Lena, you need to leave. Now."
"No, we're not done. We've been together for 2 years, and you just threw it away because I was trying to help a friend."
"You weren't helping a friend," I interrupted. "You were prioritizing your ex-boyfriend over your actual boyfriend. And you're here now because Seth didn't turn out to be what you thought he was. Not because you actually want to be with me."
She started crying then.
Security had wandered over by this point. One of them approached and asked if everything was okay.
"This woman is leaving," Quinn said, before I could answer.
Lena looked at me one more time. "I hope you're happy with your upgrade. I hope she knows that you're the kind of person who just abandons people when things get hard."
Quinn laughed. Actually laughed.
"Honey, things got hard for you the second you had to pay your own rent and realized your ex-boyfriend is useless. Peter here is thriving. The only thing he abandoned was a situation where he wasn't valued. That's called self-respect."
Security escorted Lena out. She was still crying, still trying to look back at me.
I felt a mix of emotions. Pity, relief, vindication. But mostly just tired.
Quinn touched my arm. "You okay?"