Everything about her apartment—the chunky ashtrays and stacked Cahiers du Cinéma, the low Japanese-looking double bed, the kitchen with its aperitif bottles and espresso machine—all conveyed a level and granularity of style that we could not aspire to, living, as we did, in dormitories full of institutionalized furniture and schoolbooks. “I find this apartment very intimidating,” Svetlana had said, voicing what we had both been thinking. “Jeanne is only twenty but she already has a taste.”
