The appartment as laboratory
“These are not the sort of observations my editor is interested in.”Page 17
"I don’t answer such queries, or I answer them selectively, the way I’m selective with what observations do and don’t go into the pieces I send her.” p18"
""""“She wants a nice little packet of memories she can serialize for her readers. Even better would be memories tied up with those observations she’s so fond of. “"p19
"I believe they had a happy holiday, though you never know what really goes on in a family, even if you can see through their windows.” p33
« Across the way our neighbor—an older woman my siblings and I long ago dubbed Tante Shunta because she never went anywhere without her handbag”p40
"I avoid them. Even though my belly aches for the taste of home, I cannot endure the inquisition that would follow if they saw something we share in my face.”p49
"“I shake my head, and he inclines his again, eyes narrowing like I’m a specimen he’s studying. I don’t like to be studied, and I turn away,”p51
". I hate that he sees me, hate the idea that I am, in this particular way, so transparent" p52
"“It’s terribly presumptuous. I frown down at the cobblestone pavement beneath my feet, wondering what it is about me that screams Muslim.. I am fair-skinned with dark hair that I have not covered since the day I left home. I dress in jeans and jumpers and the same damn clothes everyone else here wears. I’ve assimilated" p52
"Does he think he can fix me, this imam in this little city where all I want is to be invisible?" p52
“In South Tower A, fourth floor, flat three there lives an old man. Very old,.. He lives alone in that flat. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say he is in the process of dying alone in that flat…No one visits, and he visits no one.” p57
“Across the way, in the East Tower, third’ floor, flat two, No-Lights-Man is looking in his box again. The lights are off.. He sits cross-legged, head down, with things I can’t see in his lap. »p58
“I don’t know what she’s yelling, but I imagine it’s something like, “Do you want crackers in your soup?” or “Of course I'll make tea, how long have we been married?”p59
“ The streets are full of people, but I hardly notice them…They seem like mannequins to me, or a trick of light and atmosphere, and if I were less careful and bumped into someone, I'd just go right through them.”p68
"These results are corroborated by the Rorschach record which indicates that the patient devotes a considerable amount of energy to staying alert to her surroundings. This excessive concern indicates a feeling of constant peril, as though a situation could become life-threatening if the patient fails to closely monitor it." p80
."No one comes to my flat. Ever. It’s my place, my sanctuary, my hiding hole. It is the only place, in the entire world, where I feel halfway safe. So no, she cannot come; no one can come there.” p93
"“In South Tower A, second floor, flat three Matt is in Chloe’s room. She isn’t there; there’s no one else in the flat as far as I can tell..He moves quickly, crouching beside her bed, his too big jeans dragging and pooling at his feet.. takes out a can of spray paint with a bright red cap. There are other cans in there, but I can’t see what color they are.”p99
"“I wash the windows,(in Aleppo)” p106
"“I move away, grinning at my now-spotless window(Aleppo)”
“I desperately want to know what's under his bed. I want to peel apart his layers, like an onion, and lay bare all his bright, brazen whiteness. » p129
« Every movement is an uncoordinated jerk, my hand whipping the window even though there’s no glass to wipe, »p175(Aleppo)
"
"I imagine it as a kind of grand estate, and the flats all have people in them, and the ones in flat A are unaware of whats happening in flat B**.(page 236)** Of course, there are obvious issues with that analogy. You know how its wrong to go snooping in other peoples rooms? Thats kind of how my memories feel. It’s how I feel about my past. Ive already brought more of it out than I thought I would. If I give more, if I use my name and all of my story... who knows what all that rooting around will dig up? »p236
“The old man is choking, and at first I have no reaction to it. It seems to me like a film or television show playing out before me. They, the people in the windows, are not real, just slideshows I watch to pass the time. »p265