When I look back on that incident, I shudder at what I almost lost. Had I been more prideful, somewhere in the world today (probably in the bottom of my desk drawer) there would be a short story called “Pilgrims,” ten pages long, which nobody would’ve ever read. It would be untouched and pure, like polished granite, and I might still be a

I realized that I envied her—because of her curiosity and fearlessness, and because Ivan had written a whole book about her. I wondered if anything I wrote would ever become a library book, with my name in gold letters.