* * *
Monday was a masterpiece of people pretending not to look.
Margot came out of the elevator at eight-forty and felt the floor go quiet in the particular way an office goes quiet, not silence but a lowering, like a radio someone has turned down without turning off. People who had never once in four years needed to pass her office suddenly needed to pass her office. The accounting team developed an interest in the plant by her door.
On the company messaging channel, in the room called #watercooler that was meant for lost umbrellas and birthday cake announcements, someone had posted on Saturday night a photo of the Wall of Merry with the first booth print circled in red, and the caption *the one that got away??*. It had nineteen reactions. One of them was a small animated fire. By Monday morning the post had been deleted, but deleted things in an office are like ghosts in a farmhouse: everyone knows exactly where they used to stand.
At nine-oh-two, an all-staff email arrived from Bettina.
*Dear Farrow & Lisle family,*
*THANK YOU for making our holiday party such a success! A special thank-you to our Ice Committee (you know who you are), to Mr. Farrow for his beautiful piano, and to Dottie for running the photo booth. I want to gently remind everyone that the booth was meant to be a space of joy, creativity, and CONSENT, and that photos and the people in them belong to themselves. Snowflakes may be taken home starting Wednesday. Please do not take more than three.*
*Warmly,*
*Bettina*
Anil appeared in Margot's doorway with two coffees and the email open on his phone.
"Consent in capitals," he said. "She's been up all weekend."
"She's mortified."
"She's furious. She told me in the elevator that she's going to find whoever posted that picture and 'make them understand the history of the instant camera as a tool of intimacy.' I think she means a lecture. I hope she means a lecture." He set a coffee on her desk. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine."
"Margot."
"I'm fine, Anil. Nothing happened. It's a story about a hat."
He looked at her for a long moment. He had a way of looking at a sentence until it confessed.
"Okay," he said at last. "It's a story about a hat. If you want to tell me the part that isn't about a hat, I'm here until six."