The Days of Abandonment

by Elena Ferrante

But a favor has to be answered by another favor, and the courtesies became a chain that imprisoned us.

wanted to write stories about women with resources, women of invincible words, not a manual for the abandoned wife with her lost love at the top of her thoughts.

like a plant watered for years that is abruptly allowed to die of drought.

Eliminate the exclamation points. He’s gone, you’re still here.

I wanted him to love my body forgetful of what one knows of bodies. Beauty, I thought anxiously, is this forgetfulness.