Phoebe changed into her sleeping shirt, turned off the light and lay on the bed, arms folded. The ceiling was made of white squares that sparkled faintly. Her heart pounded in her ears. Something was wrong. She’d failed, Phoebe thought, but at what? Imagining herself in Europe, she’d always pictured someone else, physically even, a tall blonde with an answer for everything—as if, in the course of this journey, she would not only shed her former life but cease to exist as herself. Yes, she thought, to leave Phoebe O’Connor behind and be reborn as someone beautiful, mysterious. But the opposite had happened; her own narrow boundaries had hemmed her in, keeping everything real at a distance.