1.

After dinner everyone repaired to the back where the pool was lit and ringed with burbling fountains. A stand of bamboo rose overhead. The couches and chairs were thick with deep cushions. It had been a magnificent dinner. Five couples. The ladies all dressed up and looking good. Moms...

There was a girl in high school; her name was Kaysha -- who had a particular look. She wasn't the only girl with this look at St. Ann's, but she was the one who was most committed. She had the most style. She was part of a group who often...

I turned down the driveway, which descended slightly from the road, the house barely visible through the pines. The feeling was of entering a secret world. I arrived in front of an open-air garage, filled with vintage Corvettes and Maseratis. Just beyond it, across a stretch of lawn, was a...

I go to the Apple store on the upper west side to replace a battery. The city is sparkling, almost too bright. We'd had an earthquake, which was almost comic, and a hurricane, which was almost not, but that was in the past. The present rolls on.

Walking into an...