We went down the elevator together, walked the few doors to the coffee shop, I was not wearing my boots, only my shoes, I remember that. I had in mind to return as soon as possible to the studio, to my solitude there. The young man who’d been working in the coffee shop many months — more months than he’d planned — greeted me, he knew me. Or should I say: he knew my coffee habits. What time I came in (ten a.m., and then again, at noon). What I ordered (a small filtered coffee). Where I sat (at the small table next to the window). That’s what he knew. And he knew how I paid (debit card).

The journalist and I drank coffee (she, tea, I remember), we sat at my usual table, and I watched the steamed-up windows, snow flaking outside. I can’t remember what we spoke about, we limped around subjects: what I was working on now, how I liked New York, did I travel much? (I did not.) Perhaps we spoke about some current exhibitions. But it ended, at last. Her coat, her black hat, her boots, I watched her, her young figure, walk down the street under the soft, falling snow, towards the subway.

A few days later her article appeared. She’d taken a photo of me, it was black-and-white, I felt it didn’t reveal much. My figure, my slight figure, on that wooden chair, a blank wall behind me, my face, and my dark hair curved on one shoulder.

Howard was amused, he brought the newspaper into our bedroom where I still lay that morning. It’s alright, he said. I remember sitting up and reading it, I had to turn the lamp on to read it, in my dim room.

The article was alright. It didn’t say much. She’d written about process, some technical things. She mentioned the usual: the clarity, the light, the simplicity, of my work. But where did that clarity, that light, that simplicity come from? She had asked, but I had been unable to say, I have always been unable to say, until now. Until now.

For a moment I felt annoyed with the journalist. She wasn’t very good at her job, I thought. She was too young, she lacked knowledge of deep things, she lacked knowledge of South Africa. But then I thought, it is I who is wrong, too. These interviews are no good; they are useless. They are even deceptive. I suddenly felt like a liar. But I wasn’t a liar; not really. Not really a liar.

Howard said then: it’s the editor’s fault. They send people who don’t know about some other country’s history. And then: ah, whatever.

It’s really alright though, the article’s alright, he said. It was.

But I never invited a journalist to my studio again.

And then: an image of my mother came to me. My mother, long gone, buried in the dusty cemetery near Villiers. If my mother had seen and read the article, she would have said: a lovely picture of you, Jacqueline. Lovely! And I thought: what had that to do with anything? The familiar twinge of irritation, I felt it, as I imagined her faint voice across that black phone line, I almost heard it.