New Year’s Story by Sigrid Nunez

Photo by Frank and Helena 

New Year’s Story

by Sigrid Nunez

ON THE MORNING of the first day of the year, Nell is looking over her bookshelves while listening to a podcast. She’d made a single New Year’s resolution: to declutter her small apartment, starting with getting rid of some of her books. On the podcast, a journalist is explaining why January first is such a common birthday in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Nell’s eye lands on the spine of a thin paperback by a French writer, Édouard Levé. She pulls it from the shelf and reads the back cover: “Édouard Levé was born on January 1, 1965.”

The Rabbit’s Foot by Sigrid Nunez

 

Illustration by Damien Cuypers

The Rabbit’s Foot

by Sigrid Nunez

HE WAS A DUKE, or an earl—he was some sort of nobility—and not the first of his kind to visit the hotel. Royalty, rock stars, movie stars, rich and famous people from all over the world came to stay there. Some had become familiar faces, returning each time they happened to be in New York. Couples who’d spent their wedding nights at the hotel booked the same room for their anniversaries, and there was a family that got together every Christmas and requested that a tree and decorations for hanging be waiting in their suite when they arrived. As for the English lord, he’d been there once already, a year ago, then as now by himself. It was not uncommon for a guest to sign the register using a false name. Last time, he’d been the Count of Monty Python. This time, he was Lord Sauron.