Her husband’s colleagues told her that after it first happened, you could see people quietly scanning the exits in bars and restaurants. How long would it take to escape? One minute? Two minutes? She waited for the call and, when it came, she went to the school. On the Metro she thought about how easy it would be to step off somewhere else, disappear. It occurred to her that, for the whole of her life, she might never stop having that thought.

‘I haven’t seen you in ages,’ she said to the teacher.

‘It was three days ago.’

‘I know.’

‘It was three days ago. I remember, believe me.’ There was the flicker of a bold smile.

‘I admire your relentless professionalism.’

‘Thank you.’

She walked behind the teacher, following the clip-clop of her work heels through the long corridor of identical lockers. They walked up several flights of stairs, until they came to a door marked ‘No Entry.’ They entered. Inside there was nothing, a couple of disused ping-pong tables, some broken furniture. At the front there was a curtain.

‘I thought you might like to watch,’ the teacher said and pushed back the curtain, revealing a pane of glass, opening, miraculously, into light.

The woman came closer to the glass and leaned against it. Below, in the gym, a class was happening. She saw the fierce shape of a coach in the centre. Twenty young boys squatted on scattered blue mats, small heads, small bodies, in various states of stretching. She searched for the boy and found him, his body taut, ready to launch, and she held her breath.

You’re Going to Forget Me Before I Forget You

You’re Going to Forget Me

BEFORE I FORGET YOU

My sister called because she couldn’t remember how to make small talk. She’d been having treatments with a doctor she’d encountered online. He specialised in torn minds. He helped women, specifically. It was a difficult process to discuss over the phone. When it first happened, she imagined the small talk words imprinted on the long, uncontrollable sausage-dog from our favourite childhood animation: off he went, walkabouts, his tail haughtily skimming the sky, the words she so desperately needed worn on his long body.

‘That dog was so bold,’ she said. ‘Do you remember him?’

I did. The situation was that she could still discuss politics and art, if she wanted to discuss those things, which she usually didn’t, but she couldn’t say, ‘Hey, how are you?’ She was worried that this new development with small talk might lead people to dislike her in the workplace and other public settings; in her local coffee shop, for example. She would still, as a pregnant woman, like the pleasure of a small cake and an agreeable time. What was so wrong with that? ‘Nothing wrong with that,’ I said.