scraps

"Phoebe!" Susan chimed, matching Phoebe's exultant tone as she descended from her perch and enveloped Phoebe in an overblown bear hug—as if they actually liked each other, as if they hadn't seen each other in ten years when the truth was more like a year. "Ohmygod you look so great!"

"Thanks. So do you," Phoebe lied. In fact, she'd never seen Susan look worse. Her skin was blotchy. It was pretty obvious she'd gained weight. Susan, Phoebe thought with a combination of disdain and jealousy, but mostly just disdain, was one of those girls for whom mediocrity was its own reward.

"The Male Gaze," a story by Lucinda Rosenfeld, The New Yorker, 3 July 2000

prev
index
next