I braced myself for the gossip when I got into the office the next morning.
After James had left yesterday, the other deltas had been suspiciously quiet. I knew they were waiting for me to leave to start speculating on James, and me, and my family.
I was surprised to find that no one seemed to be talking about me. Maybe I got away with it?
But no. While there was no feeling of eyes on me—that sense where you walk into a room and realize everyone’s been talking about you—there were whispers. All the deltas were talking about something.
But it wasn’t about me.
I exhaled in relief, but the tension returned as quickly as it left. The name I kept hearing was Maya’s, and whatever they were saying about her couldn’t be good for me.
I walked into the break room and put the kettle on to
