I suddenly felt large and fanciful, full of gregarious jollity, the kind of feeling a host gets at the end of a long, complicated party when the last guest is leaving and seems, in that moment, like the dearest, most wonderful friend in the world, and whose soon-to-be-gone presence reminds the host that they’re all human, and in this soup together, battling this fleeting timeline as one, and the thanks and smiles and sentimental goodbyes are laid on extra thick, all because freedom is in sight.
