Educated

31 Tragedy Then Farce The day before I returned to England, I drove seven miles along the mountain range, then turned onto a nar ...

diverged from my sister’s, and it felt as though there was no common ground between us. The hours passed; it was late afternoon; ...

others to visit him in Rome during the spring holiday. “You can come, too,” he said. We handed in our final essays for the term, ...

The next morning was cloudless. We took a picnic of wine and pastries to the grounds of the Villa Borghese. The sun was hot, the ...

you, Audrey wrote. But when my own mother didn’t believe me, I stopped believing myself.fn1 It was a mistake she was going to co ...

Shawn always said you picked the fights, and I guess I wanted to believe that, because it was easier. Because you were strong an ...

There was a pause, then more words appeared—words I hadn’t known I needed to hear, but once I saw them, I realized I’d been sear ...

pulling me away from them. It had come from those moments on the floor, from knowing that Mother was in the next room, closing h ...

32 A Brawling Woman in a Wide House When I next returned to Buck’s Peak, it was autumn and Grandma-down-the- hill was dying. For ...

“This bathroom is for senior management only,” she said. “Bottle fillers must use the bathroom in the annex.” “I don’t work here ...

“The power of God on earth,” he shouted into the mouthpiece. “That’s what these oils are: God’s pharmacy!” The noise in the hous ...

When we arrived home from the service, Dad was incensed that lunch wasn’t ready. Mother scrambled to serve the stew she’d left t ...

The door opened, a sliver at first, then wider, and there was my mother, her skin glistening from the shower, wrapped in a towel ...

33 Sorcery of Physics I didn’t stay long on Buck’s Peak, maybe a week. On the day I left the mountain, Audrey asked me not to go ...

produce a piece of original academic research. In other words, having spent five years reading history, I was now being asked to ...

Buck’s Peak was unchanged. The Princess was buried in snow but I could see the deep contours of her legs. Mother was in the kitc ...

milkshakes. The conversation was calm, comfortable, like it had been years before on those dusky evenings in the corral. He told ...

silence. He drove the last mile to Buck’s Peak chatting cheerfully, almost playfully, about whether to watch The Man Who Knew To ...

34 The Substance of Things I didn’t feel particularly brave as I approached my father in the Chapel that night. I saw my role as ...

prison but that some type of intervention was needed. I turned to Mother, waiting for her to add her voice to mine, but she was ...