I was sitting in my living room that Sunday morning,
working on the broken clasp of one of my anklets, my
favorite anklet. The most expensive piece of jewelry I
owned, it was a silver chain studded with diamond chips
given to me by an ex-girlfriend. But the price tag was
hardly the reason I cherished it. She gave it to me last
year for my twenty- fourth birthday and I considered it a
sign of how she felt about me. I was in love with her and
it was her way of saying she felt the same.

Frustrated, I …