He told her she resembled an artist with a name like a man’s. She forgot the name of the artist he told her she resembled, and spent days trying to remember what the name was. He had said that the resemblance went beyond the physical: she talked like the artist, she laughed like the artist, she made jokes like the artist. She thought: the name would come back to her eventually. She thought: maybe I should email him and ask directly for the name. She worried it would seem too self-absorbed.

She went to the movies. The movie theater published a quarterly bulletin of reviews, articles and interviews. Reading a copy of the bulletin as she waited in the lounge she encountered one of her favorite columns: a quarterly diary written by an actress who was also an excellent writer. In the diary the actress talked about what a difficult season it had been personally and professionally. She talked about being so unhappy and ill she didn’t even know how unhappy and ill she was, and about the burden of a generalized unhappiness whose source couldn’t be located. The actress didn’t talk about the unhappiness in exactly these terms, she spoke elliptically of a broken heart. The diary was raw but carefully considered and well-written, and it made her feel a little better that she wasn’t the only one feeling burdened by a sourceless unhappiness. She looked at her phone and thought: if I look at my phone and all I see on the screen is the date and time, if I see that no one has tried to contact me, I will truly feel miserable at that sight. She looked at her phone and saw only the date and time. The movie theater was filling up slowly and she was in her seat. She was almost finished with the actress’s diary, the actress was describing an exhibition she saw at a downtown gallery, and she recognized a man’s name. Why did she recognize that man’s name? Of course, it was the artist he had said she resembled, and she wasn’t a man at all. She thought: I knew the name would come back to me. She almost laughed. The screen went dark: Feature Presentation.