Clingstone’s gaze turned inward, and more gently she said, “It never occurs to people that maybe I’d like to be the reckless one. The disrupter! As the years have passed, I have discovered in myself this . . . energy. Is it anger? A touch of spite? I’m not sure.” She looked back toward the restaurant. The beans on their strings were rippling on a b

Psychologists, I recollected, have ascertained that the comparative inferiority of women in contexts described as purely intellectual, is attributable to the greater discouragement and repression of their curiosity when children. “Thank you, Sally. But I’m quite happy here, you know.” “You’re not. Are you, Mel?” “No. I’m not.” “Well then?” One day

Already Alex was practicing what she would say to Simon, calculating exactly how childish she’d have to act to escape his anger.

This game of convincing people how much things were worth—in that way, she and Simon were not so different.