Chapter 137

• The hotel lobby in Paris still smelled faintly of polished wood and the citrus polish they used on the brass railings. It was late evening, and the warmth of the lights inside contrasted sharply with the damp air that clung to my coat from the drizzle outside. I had just come back from a quiet dinner with Julian, still carrying the faint hum of the day’s applause somewhere in my chest.
• We had not talked much over dinner. It wasn’t an intentional silence, just the kind that comes when both people are processing. I had spoken in front of hundreds that afternoon, answered questions from the stage, and walked away feeling I had done what I came to do. But the question from that one journalist — the one about my exile years — had lingered in the background all evening. I had answered calmly, but the shift in the air afterward was hard to ignore.
• When I reached our floor, Julian was already in the room. He had taken his tie off, his shirt sleeves rolled to his elbows, leaning against the small table by the window. The city lights glittered beyond him in the wet dark.