Galatea: A Short Story

by Madeline Miller

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I just love the scent of the narcissus.” It was the first thing I thought of, but it only made him frown more, because there were no flowers here, since we are on the rocky edge of a cliff over the sea, so that if I tried to climb out the window, I would not escape but die.

And he sent me to bed, and after, in the torchlight, he wondered at the marks on me, the red around my neck, and the purple on my arms and chest where he had gripped me. He rubbed at them, as though they were stains, not bruises. “The color is perfect,” he said, “Look.” And he held up the mirror so I could see. “You make the rarest canvas, love.”