When the Bull Market Breaks

Margaret's hair had started coming out in clutches three months after the merger. She'd find it on her pillow, dark threads against white linen, like ink spills she couldn't clean. At forty-two, she was the youngest partner at the firm, but standing before the bathroom mirror at 2 AM, she looked ancient.

The cat showed up on her fire escape that Tuesday—a mangy tabby with one ear and an attitude that reminded her painfully of herself. Margaret had spent twenty years climbing the corporate ladder, taking the bull by the horns, shattering glass ceilings, leaning in until her spine curved permanently forward. She'd forgotten how to sit still.

"You're welcome to stay," she told the cat, setting out a saucer of milk. "But I might not be here much longer."

Her father had called it bullshit when she took the job. "You're selling your soul for numbers on a screen," he'd said, dying of cancer in their living room. She'd kissed his forehead and gone back to work the next day. Some regrets don't hit you until you're staring at your own reflection, wondering when you became someone else entirely.

The board meeting was scheduled for noon. She was supposed to present the quarterly projections, spin the narrative, sell them on the next round of layoffs. efficiency. optimization. the words felt like stones in her throat.

Instead, she found herself in a pet store at eleven, buying cat food and a litter box. The tabby watched her through the window, patient as judgment.

She missed the meeting. Her phone buzzed twenty times in ten minutes—urgent, we need you, this is unprecedented. Margaret turned it off and walked home, the cat food bag heavy against her chest like a child.

The cat was still there. As she climbed through the window, she caught her reflection in the glass—hair messy, eyes tired, something behind them she hadn't seen in years: peace.

"You know what?" she said, scratching behind the cat's ears. "Fuck the bull market."

The cat purred. For the first time in two decades, so did she.