The Hours

by Michael Cunningham

Julian; ah, Julian. Was there ever more persuasive evidence of nature’s fundamental inequity than Julian, Vanessa’s oldest, at age fifteen? Julian is bluff and sturdy, royal; he possesses a gracefully muscular, equine beauty so natural it suggests that beauty itself is a fundamental human condition and not a mutation in the general design.

Before following them, Virginia lingers another moment beside the dead bird in its circle of roses. It could be a kind of hat. It could be the missing link between millinery and death.