Lisa Genova - Still Alice

She looked out her enormous office window and watched the joggers as they traced the winding edges of the Charles.

"Will you have time for a run today?" she asked.

"Maybe," said John.

He looked out the window, too, as he drank his coffee. She wondered what he saw, if his eyes were drawn to the same joggers or if he saw something entirely different.

"I wish we'd spent more time together," she said.

"What do you mean? We just spent the whole summer together."

"No, not the summer, our whole lives. I've been thinking about it, and I wish we'd spent more time together."

"Ali, we live together, we work at the same place, we've spent our whole lives together."

In the beginning, they did. They lived their lives together, with each other. But over the years, it had changed. They had allowed it to change. She thought about the sabbaticals apart, the division of labor over the kids, the travel, their singular dedication to work. They'd been living next to each other for a long time.

"I think we left each other alone for too long."

"I don't feel left alone, Ali. I like our lives, I think it's been a good balance between an independence to pursue our own passions and a life together."

She thought about his pursuit of his passion, his research, always more extreme than hers. Even when the experiments failed him, when the data weren't consistent, when the hypotheses turned out to be wrong, his love for his passion never wavered. However flawed, even when it kept him up all night tearing his hair out, he loved it. The time, care, attention, and energy he gave to it had always inspired her to work harder at her own research. And she did.

"You're not left alone, Ali. I'm right here with you."

He looked at his watch, then downed the rest of his coffee.

"I've got to run to class."

He picked up his bag, tossed his cup in the trash, and went over to her. He bent down, held her head of curly black hair in his hands, and kissed her gently. She looked up at him and pressed her lips into a thin smile, holding back her tears just long enough for him to leave her office.

She wished she'd been his passion.

SHE SAT IN HER OFFICE while her cognition class met without her and watched the shiny traffic creep along Memorial Drive. She sipped her tea. She had the whole day in front of her with nothing to do. Her hip began to vibrate. It was 8:00 a.m. She removed her BlackBerry from her baby blue bag.

Alice, answer the following questions:

1. What month is it?

2. Where do you live?

3. Where is your office?

4. When is Anna's birthday?

5. How many children do you have?

If you have trouble answering any of these, go to the file named "Butterfly" on your computer and follow the instructions there immediately. September

34 Poplar Street, Cambridge

William James Hall, room 1002

September 14

Three

She sipped her tea and watched the shiny traffic creep along Memorial Drive.

OCTOBER 2004

She sat up in bed and wondered what to do. It was dark, still middle of the night. She wasn't confused. She knew she should be sleeping. John lay on his back next to her, snoring. But she couldn't fall asleep. She'd been having a lot of trouble sleeping through the night lately, probably because she was napping a lot during the day. Or was she napping a lot during the day because she wasn't sleeping well at night? She was caught in a vicious cycle, a positive feedback loop, a dizzying ride that she didn't know how to step off. Maybe, if she fought through the urge to nap during the day, she'd sleep through the night and break the pattern. But every day, she felt so exhausted by late afternoon that she always succumbed to a rest on the couch. And the rest always seduced her to sleep.

She remembered facing a similar dilemma when her children were around two years old. Without an afternoon nap, they turned miserable and uncooperative by the evening. With a nap, they stayed wide awake hours past their usual bedtime. She couldn't remember the solution.

With all the pills I'm taking, you'd think at least one would have drowsiness as a side effect. Oh, wait. I have that sleeping pill prescription.

She got out of bed and walked downstairs. Although fairly confident it wasn't in there, she emptied her baby blue bag first. Wallet, BlackBerry, cell phone, keys. She opened her wallet. Credit card, bank card, license, Harvard ID, health insurance card, twenty dollars, a handful of change.

She rifled through the white mushroom bowl where they kept the mail. Light bill, gas bill, phone bill, mortgage statement, something from Harvard, receipts.

She opened and emptied the contents of the drawers to the desk and file cabinet in the study. She emptied the magazines and catalogs out of the baskets in the living room. She read a couple of pages from The Week magazine and dog-eared a page in the J. Jill catalog with a cute sweater. She liked it in sea-foam blue.

She opened the junk drawer. Batteries, a screwdriver, Scotch tape, blue tape, glue, keys, a number of chargers, matches, and so much more. This drawer probably hadn't been organized in years. She pulled the drawer completely off its tracks and dumped the entirety of its contents onto the kitchen table.

"Ali, what are you doing?" asked John.

Startled, she looked up at his bewildered hair and squinting eyes.

"I'm looking for..."

She looked down at the items jumbled before her on the table. Batteries, a sewing kit, glue, a tape measurer, several chargers, a screwdriver.

"I'm looking for something."

"Ali, it's after three. You're making a racket down here. Can you look for it in the morning?"

His voice sounded impatient. He didn't like having his sleep disrupted.

"Okay."

She lay in bed and tried to remember what she'd been looking for. It was dark, still middle of the night. She knew she should be sleeping. John had fallen back to sleep without ceremony and was already snoring. He was a fast sleeper. She used to be, too. But she couldn't fall asleep. She'd been having a lot of trouble sleeping through the night lately, probably because she was napping a lot during the day. Or was she napping a lot during the day because she wasn't sleeping well at night? She was caught in a vicious cycle, a positive feedback loop, a dizzying ride that she didn't know how to step off.

Oh, wait. I have a way to get to sleep. I have those pills from Dr. Moyer. Where did I put them?

She got out of bed and walked downstairs.

THERE WERE NO MEETINGS OR seminars today. None of the textbooks, periodicals, or mail in her office interested her. Dan didn't have anything ready for her to read. She had nothing new in her inbox. Lydia's daily email wouldn't come until after noon. She watched the movement outside her window. Cars zipped around the curves of Memorial Drive, and joggers ran along the curves of the river. The tops of pine trees swayed in the turbulent fall air.

She pulled all of the folders out of the bin marked HOWLAND REPRINTS from her file cabinet. She'd authored well over a hundred published papers. She held this stack of research articles, commentaries, and reviews, her truncated career's worth of thoughts and opinions, in her hands. It was heavy. Her thoughts and opinions carried weight. At least, they used to. She missed her research, thinking about it, talking about it, her own ideas and insights, the elegant art of her science.

She put the pile of folders down and selected her From Molecules to Mind textbook from the bookcase. It, too, was heavy. It was her proudest written achievement, her words and ideas blended with John's, creating something together that was unique in this universe, informing and influencing the words and ideas of others. She'd assumed they'd write another someday. She flipped through the pages without being lured in. She didn't feel like reading that either.