The truth of it, she thought, was that men lose interest when the veil falls off and they learn the normalcy of a woman—that she urinates and bleeds and cries and snores like everyone else. But women grow fonder when a man feels within reach. Women do not worship gods; they yearn for broken toys they can mold and imprint on. It was so stupid, and she hated herself for it. Yet perhaps this was what a woman’s idealism is: not the reach for a utopia—everyone had lived long enough to know perfection was beyond reach—but the need to transform one thing into something better.
