Everything was cold: the woman, the lighting, the furniture, the pervasive flavor of humiliation in Polly’s dry mouth. The fucking gloves—what was that about? The Testgiver said, “Some people complain a lot. We’re used to it.”

We, the wall of authority. Keep the patient small. In a follow-up, Polly was told her tests showed that she was perfectly average. “Well,” said Polly. “Then why do I feel so odd?”

The youngish neuropsychologist, who said Polly and Ned should call him Dr. P (“for simplicity”), leaned back with his hands up, as if to say, What can you do? Polly scanned the sheaf of papers he’d handed her, passing them on to Ned one by one. She’d done honorably in language skills, not well at all in spatial skills and math. Ned asked about the comparison group, and the doctor beamed. Polly was stellar against sixty-year-old high school graduates, and a solid average compared to older college graduates.

As Polly watched Ned read, she began to bridle. How could the doctor be sure that her scores wouldn’t have been higher before the accident? For a fast vocabulary recall, Polly pretended that she was walking through a fancy New York grocery where she worked in her twenties—had he seen the words she’d written? Celeriac? Pancetta? Why on earth had a clock face been flipped backward, for a month? The thirtieth percentile for spatial and math—Polly laid no claims to anything beyond algebra II and geometry, but before the accident, she’d measured out every inch of the house when they’d renovated.

“You might be depressed,” he said. “Only natural, given your constant questioning of your state of mind. Or it could be a matter of stress. You said you have trouble sleeping. The aging brain, menopause.”

Polly had just turned forty-two. Dr. P was getting a jump, there. It could be a lot of things, but she thought the simplest explanation might be best: Her head had slammed down on pavement. The neuropsychologist—whose bill would be paid by the old man’s insurance company—was not endearing himself to his patient, or adept at luring her toward his chosen point of view. He had a sharp, tiny nose and the tic of pulling on his small, white fingers while he talked, as if he were taking off a ring or giving a tentative hand job.

Ned tapped her on the knee; Ned almost always knew where her mind was headed. When Polly snapped back into the here and now, the doctor was saying that everyone thought they were more intelligent than they were.

Ned, normally too composed for his own good, grew pink. “She edited. She cooked at high speed. She didn’t have to pause and think through every step.”