March 31, 2026 · Julia Langbein

Dear Monica Lewinsky

“Last night, when I found my old diary, I had forgotten that you were—happening—at the same time. I was cruel about you in the summer of ’98.” Enthroned, she listens, almost expecting these words—no surprise moves across her face. “If I had had any empathy, any heart, I would have seen the parallels. Where I should have taken your suffering as a warning, I laughed like everyone else. It was a moral test that I failed, and it’s led to this—this sham life.” She takes it in. No protest from her about my “sham life.”