The Idiot

by Elif Batuman

The church interior smelled unmistakably of church interior.

I looked at my watch. Practically no time had passed for the last twenty minutes.

The mall had a Japanese stationery store, where I bought a new spiral notebook. It had the most supple and creamy paper, and a pink cover decorated with a maroon anthropomorphic bean. The bean had one hand on its hip, and was waving with the other hand. It was a marvelous notebook.