Sublime

eyes and thought for a moment. Everything

Gold chains were slung about her neck, and with her hair newly dressed and a bit of scent sprayed about her person, she felt quite festive

her supernatural ability to slow time,

“To live forever,” said Bunny, chin cupped in palm. The teakettle began to whistle.

Dollhouses are an almost too-literal example of these women’s shrunken ambitions—of how, when you don’t have control over the big decisions shaping your life, you narrow your focus to a world that’s small enough for you to impose your will on it.

Personality-wise, she reminded Greta of one of those exotic vegetables she was drawn to at the farmer’s market but didn’t know how to cook. Kohlrabi, maybe, or a Jerusalem artichoke. Not very approachable. Not sweet or overly familiar. Not easily boiled down or buttered up. Not corn on the cob. Greta felt an instant kinship with Sabine, since she,

she “lives at a rate and intensity and with a reality that makes other lives seem pale, thin and shadowy.”

Rushing to class I passed three especially rich, especially cool prep-school boys—the ones who had famous architects and art dealers for fathers. Each swung a plastic bag from his hand. They had taken to carrying their books in bags from the grocery store instead of in backpacks or the Danish schoolboy bags the kids from New York affected. The scop