Better, even when it was the hardest thing in the world, sort of like you.

Jean brushes past it so quickly, for something that leaves a lump in Jon's throat that he struggles to swallow. It's hard to wrap his head around something so meaningful, likely one of the kindest things any friend of his has said about it, said so plainly as to be a footnote of a deeper explanation. His knee-jerk to push back against it isn't even granted the time. He simply has to sit with it and try to manage.

"From everything you've told me, I can see that she did," Jon agrees, gentler this time. "And we all have to learn our way out of bad habits. I'm glad she had the opportunity to do so, and did right by you and your colleagues. ...What was it like, working with her in the library?"