"That does change things," she says. "It being two instead of three." It doesn't alleviate her sense that things would be smoother, less off-balance and fraught, if she'd been the one to vanish instead.

Rosie doesn't have to think about the answer to his question, but she stays quiet for a minute because of that, how immediate and sudden her reply wanted to be. If it was Charlie or Sabrina--and especially if it had been Nick--she might have tempered things, or lied, or found some way of deflecting. When Newt looks at her like that, open and considering and caring most of all, she knows she has to be honest.

"I want to be more than somebody else's Rosie." She can feel her stomach twist, sickening and painful, just from letting it out. "I want to feel like I'm not secondary, that...and they all tried, I'm not saying they didn't. Nick, especially. I know he loved me."