By now Ka was so ashamed of his wish for happiness, and so determined to punish himself for his insolence, that he imagined Ïpek uttering the cruelest truth of all: The thing that binds us together is that we have both lowered our expectations of life. But when she spoke, Ïpek said something very different from what he had imagined. “I always knew you had it in you to be a good poet,” she said. “I’d like to congratulate you on your work.”
