She'd done her best to not envision anything from this conversation. There's never any point in doing that; no way to know where things are going, no way to know how people will react, no guarantee she will have the right answers in any given moment. None of this was strategized. None of it could be; it's not her way.

It's gone wrong.

"I know you are," she says, softer. She'd have gone fetal ten minutes ago, if she ever found herself with that kind of emotional wound again and in a conversation like this, and she's done it to a friend. Near carelessly, she thinks.

She raises a hand like she might reach for him, but doesn't. She doesn't withdraw, either.

"I'm so sorry, Gustave," she says. "So much has happened... I wish I knew how to share it all without putting salt in your wounds."