The Bee Sting

by Paul Murray

her life looked like one continuous party, shifting from one city to another, like a James Bond film. Here she was at a club in Barcelona. Now she posed on the battlements of a castle in Prague. On the seashore in California, a sunset swirled around her like an emanation of her glorious red hair. In Dublin, she sat barefoot before an open fire.

She felt like she’d been buried under her parents’ lives, their failures, their unhappiness.

You’re going to college. I’ll still be stuck here.

The world had turned upside down; it was impossible to imagine it ever going back to the way it had been.

But sometimes it’s better with things you enjoy not to do them again.

Every day was the same They never went anywhere

I’m talking about seeing the world. I have one life. I want to see as much of the world as I can.