Leïla Slimani

Adèle

Amanda Autumn Berrey

She wants to be a doll in an ogre’s garden.

It’s no use anyway. Wanting to is the same as giving in. The dam has been breached. What good would it do to hold back now? Life wouldn’t be any better. She’s thinking like a drug addict, like a gambler. She’s been so pleased with herself for not yielding to temptation for a few days that she has forgotten about the danger.

Their lovemaking is not obscene enough or tender enough.

“I’m late for work. I’ll call you.” “Up to you,” replies Adam.

Adèle doesn’t like her job. She hates the idea that she must work to make a living. The only ambition she ever had was to be looked at.

She finds her life small, shabby, lacking in grandeur. Their money smells of work, of sweat and long nights spent at the hospital. It has an aftertaste of reproachful looks and bad moods. It is not a passport to idleness or decadence.

This is her favorite moment. The moment before the first kiss, nudity, intimate caresses. That moment of anticipation when everything is still possible and when she is the mistress of the magic.

Simone swallows a mouthful of gin and clicks her tongue against her incisor. “People who are never satisfied destroy everything around them.”

Adèle quotes

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