M M opens the front door of his apartment house and takes the elevator up. As he passes the third floor, he can’t suppress a smile. “Who was that you were talking to, there at the end,” his publisher had asked in the café. “Oh, just some fellow,” M replied. “Just someone who wanted to know how you get to be a writer. You know the type.” When he gets out on the fourth floor, he is still smiling. He thinks about what he needs to do. He could call Ana, no, he must call Ana, but he can do that later too, he thinks, tonight or tomorrow morning. Once he’s inside he walks straight through to the kitchen, takes a beer from the fridge, opens it, and raises it to his lips. In the living room he puts on some music—the CD he often listens to when he’s home alone. He thinks back on the final part of the reading, the moment when the man in the multifunctional vest stood up and stomped out of the room. “I’m not going to listen to any more of this!” the man had shouted. M tries to recall exactly what it was that prompted that—he seems to have pretty much forgotten it already.
