He Anlei looked at the summer house in the backyard through the kitchen window.It's early fall, and the tangled branches of the old rose bush almost hide the entire house, but in winter, its glass-paneled porch fully reveals itself.You can see its chipped door walls and cracked glass in the round window above the front door.One of the two side doors had only one hinge remaining, which Aaron said was a threat to anyone who walked by.In fact, Aaron said that the whole summer house was too dangerous and should be demolished. Thinking of this, Lacey turned her head to look at her beautiful and immaculate kitchen.Just last year, Aaron knocked out her old kitchen and replaced it with this new one. "It's the best money can buy," he says of the maple cabinets and solid wood counters.Lacey was sure it was the best cooker on the market, too, but she still missed her battered Wells counter and breakfast table in the corner. "Those tables and chairs look like a kid's handiwork in craft class," Aaron remarked, and Lacey agreed, but their ideas of beauty were obviously very different.

As always, Lacie gave in to her husband to remodel the kitchen into a sample showroom.Now whenever she bakes cookies and stains those very easily scratchable panels, she feels like she's damaging a work of art. She poured herself another cup of tea from the pot—a strong black tea from real English tea.Then she turned her head and looked at the summer house in the courtyard again.Today was a good day for reminiscing, because in three days she would be forty—and she would be celebrating with two other women whom she hadn't seen or talked to in nineteen years. In the porch behind her, her two suitcases were already packed and waiting there.She brought a lot of clothes because she didn't know what the other two women would be wearing, and Ellie's letter was very sketchy. "She doesn't talk much for a famous writer," said Aaron in a rather unpleasant tone.When he finds out that his wife has a friend with a best-selling novelist, he is rather chagrined.

"I didn't know that Allie was Allie," Lacey said, looking at the letter in amazement. "The last time I saw Ellie, she was trying to be an artist. She—" But Aaron wasn't listening. "You could ask her to speak at the club," he said selfishly. "Just last year, a client of mine said his wife was a die-hard Nijoda." Every American knows that Nijoda is the hero Faelie created.Ni Qiaoda is the kind of woman who wants to imitate, and the man wants to... In short, the set of mysterious romance stories is a big hit.Lacey had read the full volume without knowing that it was written by that lovely young woman she had known all those years ago.

Now, in the quiet of the morning, before Aaron and the two children came downstairs, Lacey thought about what she had been doing for the past nineteen years.Uninspiring, she thought.Simply put, she married the boy next door and had two children, fourteen and fifteen-year-old Zhuo Ming and Bei Jia.They are not babies anymore, she thought, sipping her tea, her eyes still on the summer house outside the window. Perhaps it was Ellie's invitation—a woman she hadn't seen in so many years—that reminded Lacie seriously of the past.However, as Ellie expressed in her letter, their one and only meeting had a major impact on Ellie's life, and she wanted to meet Lacey and Maygi again.

Yes, Lacey thought, that meeting had an impact on her life as well.Ever since that afternoon nineteen years ago, she had often thought of Ellie and Maycho.Now she's flying from Columbus, Ohio, to a small town in Maine to spend a long weekend with two other women. But why did the summer house in the courtyard catch her attention this morning?Last night she was too nervous to sleep, so by four in the morning she was out of bed and crept downstairs to prepare the toppings for the apple muffins.No one would actually eat it, she thought with a sigh.Beja would make a fuss about the calories it contained; Zhuo Ming would only rush downstairs for a few seconds to catch the school bus; — In short, tasteless food.In her home, Lacey thought, it would be a waste to try to cook authentic food.

With another sigh, Lacey picked up a warm muffin, broke it in two, and ate happily.When she got Ellie's letter last week, she had wished it had arrived six months earlier, so she would have had time to shed the extra seven kilos.Every member of the Garden Club said they were envious of Lacey's figure, which she has kept in great shape over the years.But Lacey has a ruler in her heart.Nineteen years ago she was a dancer with a small but solid body.Now, she thought, she was not fat, but her muscles were flabby.She hasn't done stretching or dancing for several years. Upstairs she heard Becca's hurried steps.She'd be the first down the stairs, the first to question her mother about making something that clogs her arteries with just one bite.Lacey sighed.Becca's personality is just like her father's.

Zhuo Ming is more like her.And if Lacie could drag him away from his friend long enough, they could sit down and talk and—as she had told him—"smell the roses." "Like your wallpaper," he had said when he was nine years old.It took a while for Lacey to understand what he was referring to, and then she smiled heartily.Inside the summer house.Her summer house was covered with rose-patterned wallpaper. Looking back now, she still remembers that day many years ago, she was sitting in the sunny kitchen, looking at her freckled son across the old dining table.Zhuo Ming is an easy-going child who can sleep until dawn when he is only a few months old.Unlike Becca, she seemed to cause confusion and confusion wherever she went.Lacey wasn't sure Becca had ever had a good night's sleep in her life.Even now, at the age of fifteen, she recklessly bursts into her parents' room at three o'clock in the morning, announcing that she heard "weird noises" from the roof.Lacey would tell her to go back to bed and sleep, but Aaron took her "weird noise" seriously.Neighbors were used to seeing Aaron and his daughter searching the house in the middle of the night with flashlights.

Lacie looked back at the summer house, she could still see the pink paint on the upper part.Fifteen years later, the paint is still lingering. She smiled to herself, remembering Aaron's expression when she bought back the paint. "If you wanted to paint the place pink, I could understand. But honey, you bought five shades of pink. Didn't the man in the store remind you?" Aaron was a firm believer that women should be taken care of by men, whether it was at home or in the paint shop. Lacey was five months pregnant with Becca, and her belly was too big to hide.Little did she know at the time that Becca would be a frontrunner on everything from making her mother aware of her existence to...well, making her presence known to the world.

Lacy told Aaron with a smile at the time that she planned to use all five pinks for the summer house.Now, fifteen and a half years later, she could still recall his expression.Lacey's mother used to say that Aaron didn't have a creative bone in him, and Lacey found that to be true over the years.But back then, when they were both so young, so happy to have just had a home of their own, her attempt to paint the crumbling summer house in pink only elicited a fit of laughter. It was Lacey who convinced Aaron to buy the Victorian mansion in an older, out-of-fashion neighborhood.What Aaron wanted was a new house, some funky condo with a white exterior and white interior.But Lacey couldn't stand the kind of house Aaron liked: perfect little square boxes separated from one big perfect square box. "But that's why I like them," Aaron said, completely unaware of her complaint.

Lacey's mother gives her the courage to stand up to her new husband. "A house belongs to a woman," her mother said. “That’s where you spend the most time and where you raise your children, and it’s worth fighting for.” In her natal family, her mother was the family fighter.Lacey, like her father, prefers to go with the flow. Lacey later said that it was the unyielding spirit of Becca in her belly that gave her courage.She played her trump card. "Aaron dear, we bought the house with the money my father left me." Aaron said nothing, but the look on his face made her say nothing like it since.

Then again, she hadn't wanted anything before, and she hasn't since, as strongly as she had for this old house in dire need of renovation.Her father was a construction contractor, and she knew what needed to be rebuilt and how the renovations should be done. "That has to be taken down," Aaron said when he saw the old summer house half hidden under a fifty-year-old tree. "But that's the most beautiful part of the house," Lacey retorted. Aaron opened his mouth to speak, but Becca chose to kick her first at this time, and the debate about the fate of the summer house has since disappeared.Later, whenever Aaron had anything to say about cleaning up the house, Lacey always replied, "Trust me." He left her to deal with the house.After all, that's when Aaron started pulling insurance, and he was very ambitious.He left early to work, joined clubs, and attended various parties.He was overjoyed when he discovered that the trendiest church in town was on the same road as the horrible house that Lacie had persuaded him to buy. And while he was at church, he found that people were quite pleased with his foresight in buying "Old Bayville House" and redecorating it. "That's a solid investment," some old man said, grabbing Aaron's shoulder. "People as young as you rarely have this level of intelligence." Then the old man bought a big insurance policy from Aaron.Since then, Aaron has become as interested in the house as Lacey.When Lacey's time was tied up by two children under the age of three, Aaron took over the rebuilding of the old house. Initially they will quarrel. "This is not a museum!" Lacey said angrily. "It's a home, and it should look like a home. Zhuo Ming's toy car will ruin that expensive table, and Beja will draw pictures on that silk wallpaper." "Then you've got to teach them to behave," Aaron snarled back. As with all contentious situations, Lacey backed down.Like her father, she would rather back down than fight.That's why her mother ran her childhood home and Aaron ran her married home.So Aaron filled the beautiful old house with antiques that he couldn't sit in or touch.There are three rooms in the house whose doors and windows are closed year-round, only opened when they need to be cleaned or when Aaron hosts a big Christmas dinner for his clients. The kitchen is the part that has been kept to the last, but last year Aaron took the room to his liking and completely remodeled it. Lacey finished her tea, rinsed the cup, and looked at the summer house again.It used to be hers.It had been her sanctuary from the world—a place where she could keep dancing, or curl up on the couch with a good book on a rainy afternoon. Now, looking at the hut, she smiled unconsciously.Before having children, a woman fantasizes about what she would like to do on a rainy afternoon.But once upon a time, must replaced want in her schedule.She had to do the laundry, she had to buy food, she had to pull Becca away from the stove. Somehow Lacie had lost her summer home.Somehow, the house had changed from hers to theirs.She knew when this situation started.At that time, she was eight months pregnant, and her belly was so big that when she walked, she had to hold it with her hands to support Beja's frequent punches and kicks. They had just demolished the living room in the house, and there was another crack in the roof.Aaron invited his brother and three colleagues over for beers and football.But it was raining that day, and there was nowhere in the house for them to sit and watch TV.When Aaron suggested that the TV be set up in the summer house, "just for one afternoon," she was so grateful for the rare peace that she forgot to protest.She has always been afraid of the smell of men smoking and drinking in a room, so when he said that he would take those people away, she was really happy from the bottom of her heart. The following weekend, Aaron brought two clients into the summer house to discuss the new policy.And it makes sense, because their living room is still a mess. "We need a place where we can sit and talk about things," he said, looking at Lacey as if to say that it was her fault that the roof repair materials hadn't arrived. Two weeks later Becca was born, and for the next year Lacie was too busy to catch her breath.Becca is insatiable in her demands for the attention of her weary mother.It took three full months before Lacey was able to calm her crying daughter to run errands.By the time Beja started walking at ten months, Lacie was pregnant again. When she was pregnant with Zhuo Ming for three months, Lai Xi walked slowly towards the summer house.From the day Aaron set up the TV there, Lacey had almost forgotten that her sanctuary still existed.From the first day of pregnancy, Zhuo Ming was more relaxed than Beja, and Laixi's mother also started to help her take her little granddaughter for a walk in the town. “Caring for a baby who can’t walk is the most boring thing in the world,” her mother once said with her usual bluntness. "I only became interested in her when she started to walk and became interested in something other than grandma." So, on what felt like her first free afternoon in a year, Lacie finally made her way to the summer house in the backyard.Maybe this time, she'll be able to curl up on a rattan recliner she found in an antique store and read a book.But when Lacey pushed open the door, her breath stopped.She had also vaguely wondered why Aaron had only used the summer house a few times and hadn't mentioned it again. Someone left the door open, and the rain soaked her furniture.Before her first pregnancy, she had made dust covers for the recliner and two armchairs herself.She also made curtains in the same color and hung them herself.But now mice have made a nest in the foam of the recliner, and the neighbor's cat has left claw marks on the arm of the sofa. She turned her head, feeling like tears were about to fall.She ran back to the big house without even closing the door again. Later, she tried to reason with Aaron, but when he said that anger was harmful to children, Lacey calmed down. "After you have your baby, we reorganize it," he said. "I promise. On the honor of the Scouts." Then he kissed her, helped her groom Becca, and finally made love to her sweetly.But he didn't tidy up the summer house. Later, Lacey was so busy taking care of the kids and helping Aaron establish himself in the community that she didn't have time for a break.As the years passed, her summer house became a storage room. "Well, how is my old girl feeling this morning?" Aaron asked behind her back.He was two months younger than Lacey, and he always joked about the age difference between them.Needless to say, Lacey didn't see the humor in it. "I made muffins," she said, turning her face away to hide her frown.She hadn't accepted the fact that she was about to turn forty.Wasn't it only last week that she boarded a bus to the Big Apple, New York City, and conquered the city with her dancing? "Yeah," Aaron said. "Wish I had the time, but today's schedule is packed." When she turned around, he was already reading the newspaper, concentrating on the financial section.Aaron hasn't changed much in the seventeen years they've been married.At least in terms of size.His hair was already grey, but it looked rather nice on his head.He says insurance brokers look more trustworthy when they are older, and he hits the gym regularly to keep in shape. The only thing that has changed is that he doesn't seem to really care about anyone anymore, and he doesn't have his wife or two kids in his eyes.Yes, Bei Jia would use coercive methods to force his attention, but Zhuo Ming and Lai Xi had easy-going personalities, so most of the time they were ignored by him. "You should leave him," Lacey's mother said, even more bluntly than her father had been alive.Widow life suits her well. "If you leave him, he'll find out how much he needs you. You've got to shake up his perfect little world and show him what's really important." But Lacy had seen what happened to women her age when they left their handsome, wealthy, successful husbands.Lacie didn't want to live in a small, gloomy apartment and work as a cashier at the local discount store. "Mom," Lacey said, usually exaggeratedly. "I don't have the skills to make a living. What can I do? Go back to dancing?" She still regrets at times that she screwed up her only chance to make a name for herself in the world. "Where did I go wrong with you?" her mother would groan and sigh. "If you leave him, he'll break down. You're the center of this man's whole life, you've done everything for him. Once you're gone, he'll—" "Elope with Bambi." Lacey answered quickly. "You're an idiot, let him hire that bitch," her mother snapped back. Lacey turned her head.She didn't want her mother to know how she protested her husband's hiring of that pretty young girl. "You hired a girl named Bambi?" Lacey said, laughing incredulously the night he told her. "Is she twelve years old?" To Lacey, it was a joke.But when she saw Aaron's expression, she could tell he didn't think his new secretary was a joke. "She's very competent," he retorted, staring defiantly at his wife. As usual, Zhuo Ming was very sensitive to any controversy, so he immediately pushed away the dinner plate. "I'm going to do my homework." He muttered and left the table. Becca never seemed to notice anything other than herself. "Did I tell you what that horrible Maja said to me today? We were having chemistry class and—" Lacey finally looked away from her husband, and since then she has stopped making any wisecracks about Bambi.But Lacey's curiosity had been piqued.She called a high school girl who worked at Aaron's company and invited her to lunch.Lacey came home after lunch and poured herself a glass of gin and carried it to the bathroom.Paula told her that Aaron had hired Bambi six months earlier and that she was not only his secretary but more like his "personal assistant".The same high school cheerleading classmate seemed to enjoy warning Lacey. "I can tell you that if he had been my husband, I would have ended their relationship immediately," Paula said emphatically. "Aaron has that girl with him everywhere he goes. All I can say is it's a good thing we don't have one of those gender-shared bathrooms, or she—" "Would you like some dessert?" Lacey said rather loudly. Now Bambi has been working for Aaron - or if the rumors are true - "under" Aaron for more than a year.Honestly, Lacey didn't know what to do.Every one of her friends has an opinion on this, and they don't hesitate to teach Lacey. One day Becca overheard a woman advising Lacey what to do with a young woman who had become so close to Aaron.When she got home, Becca said to her: "Mother, you should tell them to die!" "Becca!" Lacey snapped. "I don't like it when you speak that language." "Your husband may have an affair with his secretary, but you're here to worry about my language?" Lacey could only stand there and stare blankly at her daughter.Who is the adult?How did her daughter know— "It's all over the church and the club," said Becca, sounding thirty-five instead of fifteen. "Mom, you see, men are the most independent. Their crotch itches, that's normal. What you should do is tie a knot in his—" Lacey gasped. "Well, you can live in the nineteenth century. But that Bambi is a bitch and her target is Dad, I think you should fight back!" After Becca turned around and walked away, Lacey could only stare. her back. Lacey had no idea how to deal with the situation, so she pretended she hadn't heard the words.In fact, that seemed to be how Lacey's life was these days: pretending that everything was normal and that nothing was wrong. There are some things she really can't do, like call Aaron's office and tell his assistant to remind him of so-and-so's party.Instead, Lacey just pretends that this young woman named Bambi doesn't exist.When she went to church or at the club and met women trying to warn her, Lacey would let them know with a small smile that she didn't care about such vulgar speculation.But now, watching Aaron bent over the newspaper, she guessed wildly that he refused to eat her muffins because he was worried that he would gain weight and that Bambi would dislike him for it. "Mother!" said Becca, going into the kitchen. "How are you three old women going to spend the weekend? Do you think it's going to be a carnival with a lot of young men with bronzed muscles?" Part of Lacey wanted to reprimand her glib daughter, but aside from being a mother, she also wanted to have fun with her daughter as a woman. "Ellie will take Mel Gibson and Harrison Ford there," Lacey said, casting a glance at her husband. But Aaron didn't seem to hear her.Instead, he just looked at his watch.Although it was only seven o'clock in the morning, he said, "I should go." "Are you sure you don't want a muffin before you go?" Lacey asked, knowing her voice plaintively.What she's really trying to say is - "You bloody at least get to spend an hour with your family before you get to your bitch!" But Lacey didn't say that.Instead, she tried to smile. "Sounds like a good idea, but I have a client meeting this afternoon and we have a lot of work to do before that meeting." Although he didn't mention any names, they all knew that "we" meant Aaron and Bambi. Aaron walked over to Lacey and kissed her on the cheek. "Hope you had a good time," he said. "By the way, your birthday..." He threw her a naughty look that she couldn't resist a few years ago. "I know," she forced a smile. "You'll buy it for me in the future. It doesn't matter, anyway, my birthday is in three days." "Thanks, honey," he said, kissing her cheek again. "You're so considerate." Then, he grabbed the jacket from the back of the chair and went out. "You're so thoughtful," Becca imitated her father's voice, scooping up a spoonful of porridge that looked like sawdust. "You're the idiot." "Don't say that about your father," Lacey said, glaring fiercely at her daughter. "Don't even say that about me." "Very well," Becca pushed the chair and stood up.She was the same height as her mother, so now they were looking at each other across the breakfast table. "A good word is all you care about! Nice words, good manners, good thoughts. But the world isn't good, and what Dad and that vampire did was not good." Suddenly Becca's eyes filled with tears. "Don't you know what's next? That woman is going to tear our family apart. She wants what we have, but not this home, but our money. She wants this sterling silver tea set, and... …and this fifty-thousand-dollar kitchen—that you hate but are too cowardly to tell Dad—that you don’t want. We’ll lose everything because you’re so odiously educated.” Finished, Bey Jia turned around and ran out of the kitchen and upstairs. Immediately afterwards, a car horn sounded outside the house, and Lacey knew that it was the arrival of the bus taking her to the airport.For a moment, she hesitated.She should go to her daughter.Her daughter is sad and needs her comfort.And mothers are not always giving?Doesn't a good mother always have time for her children?A good mother—and a good wife, Lacey thought.That's who she is: mother and wife. Suddenly Lacey didn't want to be anybody's wife anymore, or anybody's good mother, and she wanted to get on a plane to see two women she'd known when she was very young, before she was a wife or a mother. It could be said that Lacey ran out of the kitchen, grabbed two suitcases of luggage from the floor of the entrance, and opened the front door."See you on Tuesday," she called to her two children, looking up the stairs, but she didn't wait for their response.A minute later, she got in the car and started the engine, and Lacey realized that she hadn't brushed her teeth.As far as I can remember, she hasn't brushed her teeth after meals since she was three years old, and now she almost wants to tell the driver to turn around. But Lacey leaned back in her chair and smiled to herself.Not brushing her teeth seems to symbolize that she is about to embark on an adventure.What awaited her was three full days of time that belonged entirely to her.become free.She hadn't traveled alone since that trip to New York nineteen years ago.Nobody chased her and asked, "Where's my tie?", "Where's my other shoe?", "Honey, can you call the counter and get me something to eat?", "Mom! What do you mean without my red shorts? How am I going to play without those shorts?" What would that feel like? For a moment, Lacey closed her eyes, thinking about the three days of freedom that were coming; then she broke into a chuckle.Surprised, she opened her eyes and saw the driver looking at her through the rearview mirror, and he had a smile on his face. "Excited to run away?" he asked. "You can tell without telling me." Lacey said sincerely. "Your partner better not let you go out for too long," the driver said, still looking at her with that flirtatious look. Lacey knew she should show him that face that Becca described as "the best church lady," but Lacey didn't want to do that now.The driver was a good-looking young man, and he was just complimenting her.She smiled at him, then leaned her head back and closed her eyes, feeling like she hadn't been in a good mood in a long, long time. Luo Elli leaned against the seat of the plane, closed her eyes and thought, what the hell am I doing? She leaned forward again and picked up the plastic cup of soda on the folding table, but as she tried to bring the cup to her lips, she saw her hands tremble.Putting down the glass, she tried to calm her nerves by looking out the window. She was on a propeller plane to Baghdad, and she was secretly glad the plane wasn't classed, because she didn't travel first class anymore.According to Ellie, she doesn't deserve the first-class treatment because she is no longer the author of five best-selling books in a row. Indeed, Ellie hadn't written a single word for three years.The story in her head has been at a standstill for three years.It's been three years since she got divorced and was persecuted by the American justice system. Ellie tried again to pick up the plastic cup, but her hands were shaking so much that the soda in the cup nearly spilled.She glanced nervously at the man sitting across the aisle, but he didn't seem to be looking at her.And, luckily, he didn't show any expression that he knew "who" she was. Or her previous identity, Ellie thought.Like those old movie stars who get stopped halfway and ask, "Are you that so-and-so?" Although Ellie has returned to her real name "Ailey Luo" and no longer bears her husband's surname, she no longer feels like she is still the best-selling author "Ailey Faye" "You can't have this birthday by yourself," said her therapist.Jenny is the only person Ellie sees regularly now.Ellie escaped the world for three years and told everyone she needed time to "recuperate".But eight months ago, after her second attempt to clear her grievance through justice failed, Ellie sought counseling. "I don't want to see anyone," Ellie said. "Everyone thinks I'm still the same person I was before." Jenny sighed.No matter what she said, nothing seemed to be able to penetrate the walls she had built in her mind. "You're still the same person. It's time you put that aside and get on with your life." "But who will recognize me now?" Ellie said heavily. Jenny squinted at Ellie for a moment. "You can lose weight. You need to hit the gym. Who knows, maybe you'll meet some people there—" "Don't do it again!" Ellie yelled anxiously. "I'll never go through that again. And who would want me? I'm fat and rich!" Jenny blinked at Ellie several times, and then both of them laughed out loud at Ellie's absurd remarks at the same time.Not many people see being rich as a sin. "You know what I mean," Ellie said. "Having experienced the previous experience, I was worried that people wanted me because of my wealth." "Well, I know," said Jenny, casting a sneaky glance at the clock hanging behind Ellie.They had made little progress in getting Ellie to let go of her past for months, and the trauma of the divorce had left Ellie feeling overwhelmed with life and unable to move on.Three years ago, Ellie was the favorite of heaven and a famous writer, but now she hardly ever leaves home.To make matters worse, she gave up all forms of physical activity, so she gained eighteen kilograms, which is too much for a person who is only 155 centimeters tall.But despite her persuasion, Jenny just couldn't get Ellie to move, to get out, out of the growing haze. "Well, there must be someone who can spend your fortieth birthday with you. If you don't want to meet with friends in the publishing industry, where are you back home?" "Richmond? You mean I should call some old high school acquaintance and ask her to share a pink birthday cake with me? You think I can find a girl classmate who dons her old cheerleading uniform and encourages me?" Jenny was all too familiar with Ellie's taunts. "There must be someone for it," she said emphatically. "Somewhere, someone!" "Actually..." Ellie said, looking at her nails, which were no longer trimmed by professional beauticians. "Go on." Jenny encouraged her. "On my twenty-first birthday, I met two women in a prison in New York. It was their birthday too, and we..." "What's the matter?" Seeing that Ellie didn't continue, Jenny urged her.This was the first time Ellie mentioned these two women, and if it was possible Ellie would come out of her apartment to join them, and Jenny would write the invitation herself. "How can you get in touch with them? Can the three of you have a birthday together?" "I don't even know where they are now. We met that day and spent a few hours together. You know, the sort of thing that happens to people. We'd be in the prison for hours because—" Ellie stopped suddenly, thinking of the situation at that time, she couldn't help but smile slightly, and it was that smile that made Jenny pursue the victory. "Call 'em and find 'em. You know their names and birthdays and look up their current addresses online. No, it's better if you tell me their names and I'll find them. You guys The three can celebrate their birthday together and talk about the past." Ellie gave her therapist a bored look. "One of them is a dancer with the most incredible body you've ever seen, and the other is a model." What Ellie didn't say was that she couldn't let them see her now. Jenny gave Ellie a hard look, then pulled out a photo album from the shelf behind her, opened it and handed it to Ellie. Ellie looks at the photo but doesn't understand what it means.It was a ballerina, tall and elegant, a beautiful girl.It took several minutes for Ellie to realize that it was the therapist she was seeing. "It's you?" "It's me," said Jenny. Ellie smiled weakly at her.Jenny is now in her early sixties and has a potato body. "A person is more than a shell," Jenny said. "If they liked you then, they'll like you now. Besides, it's been nineteen years. Have you ever seen those two women's faces or names on a billboard?" "No..." Ellie said softly. "Then obviously they didn't become famous dancing or catwalking, so who's to say what they look like now? Maybe they put on forty kilos and—" "Married to a drunkard," Ellie said, visibly lifted. "That's right," Jenny smiled. "On the bright side, maybe what happened to them was worse than what happened to you." Ellie thought for a moment. "Maybe..." she said. Jenny sat looking at Ellie for a moment, then she pressed the intercom on the phone. "Sarah, cancel my lunch appointment." Then she turned to the laptop on the table and switched it on. "Ellie, honey, let's go online and find these two women; then you're going to invite them to spend your birthday with you." "Are all psychiatrists so domineering?" "Only if she cares about her clients as much as I care about you. Also, I'd love to see more sequels to Nijoda. Hey! Let's do this, you guys can come to my house in Maine for the weekend. There's only Two bedrooms, but there's a daybed in the living room, one of you can sleep in that. Now, tell me their names." That's why Ellie is now on a plane to Baggage, Maine, and two other women who haven't seen each other in nineteen years are going to meet her, and the three of them are going to spend their birthdays together in the waterfront capital s reason. 现在她已经上了飞机，事实上，飞机即将降落——但以她过去三年来的运气判断，或许飞机会降落不成。No!珍妮曾要爱莉发誓在这一星期中，她要尽量不做负面想法。 总之，现在她真的就要飞抵会面地点了，她仍不敢相信自己竟然让珍妮威逼成行。爱莉确信另外两个女人都快乐似神仙，只有她过得惨不忍睹。 我必须停止这样，我必须停止这样，爱莉对自己叨念着。我必须强迫自己往正面思考。至少，这样可以制止旁人对我说那个白痴的半杯水道理，她想，接着她又告诫自己别再凡事嘲讽。 往好的方面想，她想，往快乐的方面想。往…… 向后靠回椅背，她闭上了眼睛。飞机制造出一种近乎声音的魔茧，除了引擎的怒吼，爱莉什么都听不清楚。座位后面她能听到一个男人用单调的口音一直叨念着什么。幸好我没嫁给他们，爱莉想，开始回忆第一次看到那两个女人的情形。