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The last time I talked to her was on a New Year’s Eve, not long before her death.

“Happy New Year!” I shouted. “I hope you’re having a glass of cognac!”

“Remember, Masha, when you and I celebrated?”

“Of course, it was wonderful.”

“You were the last. They said I shouldn’t host anymore.”
…

She thinks that in time, she will write here. But there is no rush, unlike for her friends, who always talk of another life, brighter and more established than their own. They are impatient to be rid of the modest jobs they consider embarrassments, even humiliations.

Recently, barely fifteen min…

I once heard a woman say that immediately upon finding out, she’d felt the dawning of a strange inner power. It seemed as though she could undertake any task, could live through any hardship. This was a strength not of muscles, the woman said, but of light. In this new form of herself, she felt mor…

Selin smiled. The bookshop, she explained, sold large-format books, with magnified details on every page. She spread her arms to show how big. Two years ago, she went on, Ozan was diagnosed with early retinal deterioration. In front of his right eye was a black spot that was slowly spreading. He co…

She’d come to Paris with an artist research grant and met the photographer in the final months of her visa. They admired each other’s self-sufficiency, their mutual lack of neediness. The photographer liked to tell Lara that he’d never had a partner before her who didn’t rely on him for fulfillment…