Summary

In the prologue, “The Neutral Room,” Chloé goes out for drinks with her friends Jay and Colin. When the men start discussing “whether or not [Chloé’s] life is worth living,” Chloé enters her “Neutral Room, a separated space inside [her] mind” where she goes to dissociate from pain (2).

In Chapter 1, “The Berninis,” three months after the bar incident, Chloé is in Rome visiting the Bernini sculptures at a museum. She is intrigued when she notices a stranger staring at her. She tries to stay focused on Bernini’s scene from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. While she recalls the myth, the “stranger inches closer” (6). His proximity is exhilarating.

Born with a disability, Chloé feels pain course from her hip through her body. She counts to alleviate it.

The stranger reminds Chloé of a childhood memory. When she was six, she and her father...