From Sojourn, which was published last month by New York Review Books.

The flat was new to me. I’d moved into it the day before yesterday in a hurry. It wasn’t the flat I’d arrived to. That was smaller: a kind of studio. The drawing room and bedroom merged with the kitchen. In another mood I would have found it charming. The first evening, though, I was depressed especially by the lack of demarcation between shower and toilet. The bathroom was narrow. On another day, I would have warmed to this. Which space do you own more entirely than…