story: Ghosts and Empties
author: Lauren Groff
year: 2018
where: Paris, 11th arrondissement
note: Wow, Groff has written a story about women walking, and joined the ranks of this great tradition of literature. Groff has some stories I really like–“At the Round Earth’s Imagined Corners”–and others I could leave; this is one to take, though all her work feels so autobiographical these days, which is harmless, perhaps.
a line: “It’s too much, it’s too much, I shout at my husband some nights when I come home, and he looks at me, afraid, this giant gentle man, and sits up in bed over his computer and says, softly, I don’t think you’ve walked it off yet, sweets, you may want to take one more loop.”
& an extra line:
“I smell the jasmine potent in my hair the next morning, the way I used to smell cigarette smoke and sweat after going to a night club, back when I was young and could do such unthinkable things.”
samantha Neugebauer 