In some ways, Ezra sensed his world was larger than hers because, being an intellectual at heart, he was ever-aware of what he didn’t know, and that open space hovering just outside of what he understood, though agonizing, made him confront his limitations. His not knowing demanded humility.
Ida, on the other hand, lived in a world with defined edges where she could believe herself the queen of places, the knower of things. She was the one who pointed out on the day they met that his first initial, E, inserted into her name birthed an I-D-E-A while her first initial centered inside his name could, rearranged, become ZAIRE. It was a useless coincidence but of that sort that makes chance meetings resonate and sends young lovers weeping toward futures, certain in otherworldly signs decipherable only to them. […]
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Jennifer Sears’ fiction and non-fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Fiction International, Barrelhouse, Ninth Letter, Fence, So to Speak, Mr. Beller’s Neighborhood, The Boston Globe, Gilded Serpent Journal of Middle Eastern Dance and Music, and other publications. She teaches yoga, belly dance, and writing in New York City.