I could see myself behind her in the mirror. My eyes were puffy. She didn’t even ask what was wrong. It didn’t even occur to her to see why I’d been crying. It didn’t occur to her that today was my birthday and she’d forgotten, again. But now that seemed perfectly natural. Of course she’d forgotten. Now I knew what I was worth to her. I truly, truly did. I’d been operating on the belief that I should be the most important thing in her life.
