The Vulnerables

by Sigrid Nunez

Like many women, she would always find it easier to feel for a male (except, of course, her husband, against whom she bore innumerable, lifelong, deadly grudges) than for any female. But what was it in her manner that suggested that I was somehow to blame? That even though I’d done nothing to encourage him, I did in fact owe this frog something, maybe even a lot. Tenderness for a boy she’d never met, harshness toward her own daughter.

I don’t remember who said, Insomnia is the inability to forget.