The Reply

Grace read the reply three times on her lunch break, sitting in the staff room of the college library with a cheese sandwich she forgot to eat.

The first time, she read it quickly, the way everyone reads an email, looking for yes or no. She did not find either.

The second time, she read it slowly, and she started to feel something she recognized from work. At the library, she answered emails from students who had lost books, broken laptops, or forgotten deadlines. She knew how to write an email that sounded helpful and promised nothing. She had written hundreds.

The third time, she took a pencil and underlined.

By the time her break was over, the email was covered in little lines and question marks, and she knew exactly what it was.