[ The kindly My dear briefly reminds him of Molly. ]

Oh, shit. [ Julian's ex? Damn. The healing process? Hella damn. In a level voice he comments, ] That's severely fucked up. Was your ex so awful that you genuinely thought they would have cursed you like that, with such harmful irony?

[ And then his mind wanders to Avantika; yeah, actually. He can ... imagine an ex like that. ]