Bull Market, Broken Heart

The elevator dinged at forty-three floors, and Mara smoothed her skirt, checking her reflection one last time. There, wedged between her front teeth—a fleck of **spinach** from the salad she'd nervously picked at during lunch. She dug it out with her manicured nail, heart already hammering.

Her phone buzzed. *Another vitamin supplement ad.* She'd been taking them for months since the miscarriage—D, B12, iron, whatever Dr. Patel said might help her "recover." The pills sat in a neat row on her bathroom counter like tiny soldiers of hope, but Mara knew the truth: some things vitamins couldn't fix.

"Sit down, Mara." Marcus gestured to the leather chair across from his desk. The same chair she'd sat in five years ago when he hired her, bright-eyed and hungry, fresh out of business school. Now, at thirty-four, she felt hollowed out.

"The **bull** market's been good to us," he said, not looking up from his tablet. "But we need to be smarter about overhead."

Mara's throat tightened. She knew what was coming. She'd seen the numbers. She'd helped run the analysis.

"Marcus, I can take a pay cut. I can—"

"It's not that." He finally met her eyes, and something there made her stomach drop. Not pity. Something worse. "You've been distracted this year. The errors in the Q3 projections. The missed client calls last month."

"My mother—"

"Everyone has personal things, Mara. That's why we have policies. And vitamins, and therapy, and whatever else people need to function." His voice hardened. "But you're not functioning."

The injustice of it burned hot. Marcus's wife had left him last year, and he'd drunk his way through three quarters, showed up late, slurred through presentations. Nobody had cut *him* loose.

"I'm fine," she said. "Really. I've been taking—" She stopped herself before she said *vitamins*. Before she admitted to the little rituals that kept her from falling apart entirely. "I've been better."

Marcus sighed. "Clean out your desk by end of day."

She walked out without crying, somehow. The elevator ride down felt endless. When she stepped onto the street, the city was already darkening, skyscrapers looming like tombstones. Her phone lit up again—another notification. *Daily Vitamin Reminder: Don't forget your evening supplements.*

Mara stood on the corner as commuters streamed past, and for the first time in months, she didn't reach for her phone. She let the reminder fade to black. Some things you couldn't swallow. Some things you had to spit out.

She hailed a cab. She didn't know where she was going. For once, that felt exactly right.