I threw myself into everything else instead.
Coursework, mostly final papers piling up in every class except the one that actually mattered, notes for the case study project stacking up neat and color-coded on my desk. And underneath all of it, at night, after Harlow fell asleep: the banquet speech.
I rewrote it probably nine times. Every version sounded wrong in a different way, too clinical, too raw, too much like something written for an audience instead of something actually true. By the third weekend of drafts, I finally landed on something that felt like mine.
"That's really good," Harlow said, reading over my shoulder one night. "Like, actually good, Jo. This doesn't even sound like you're hiding anything."
"I'm still hiding plenty."
"I mean in the speech. You're not hiding in
