Elizabeth switched off the radio as the hourly stock market report came on. Something about the murder, the body parts, seemed to tug at her, reminding her of Tupper and home. This rarely happened. Of course she thought of him. They had been together—and apart—for a long time. And this tug was not a longing or a yearning; it was more like curiosity. What was Tupper doing? Was he making something new and attractive and lucrative? Was he staying up all night watching television and forgetting to eat? Was their quaint Brooklyn neighborhood sullied by pumpkins and ridiculous Halloween decorations? Elizabeth didn’t carry a cell phone, so she had no way of knowing.

She’d have to go back to Brooklyn soon anyway. She needed a bath and a good hot meal and perhaps some human contact. When they were in their twenties, Tupper made her promise to speak to at least two people a day to avoid “getting so sucked into her work that she lost touch with the humans the work was for.” Elizabeth hadn’t spoken to anyone in almost two months. The cabin she’d rented for this project was unheated and it was getting cold at night. She could go home to Cobble Hill, take a bath, and put on a robe. Tupper would make her a lamb burger with red wine, and he would talk to her. It was so predictable and domestic it was almost unbearable. But she did miss him, or the idea of him.

Besides, she wouldn’t stay long. Just until she figured out the next work. This one, this project in the woods, had been good. Each day she’d created a new temporary work made of found objects at the base of a tree and taken a picture with the fancy gold phone she’d been provided with but had never connected to cell service. She’d mail in the phone (she never bothered with uploading or downloading), and the whole series would be projected on a wall at the Apple headquarters in Cupertino, California, and she would be paid handsomely. She’d collaborated with Apple years ago for the launch of another new iPhone. That project was called Find Yourself. Elizabeth built a labyrinth of tunnels that led to end zones where one could collect prizes varying from a wad of chewed gum, to live frogs, to a pair of designer flip-flops, to a hank of horsehair, to the new iPhone itself. It was immensely popular, and Apple was an excellent collaborator, providing expensive prizes and paying her an absurd amount of money.

Elizabeth had always found a way to be paid for her art. She was persuasive in an almost unspoken way—her mere physical presence was convincing enough. Usually she got what she wanted. And she never stopped. Working artists had to work. As soon as she was finished with one project she would move on to the next.