Excerpt from Divide Me By Zero by Lara Vapnyar, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

Len finally hung up, and I cleared snow off the edge of a lawn chair and sat down, savoring the moment of peace before I had to go down and face Victor. He was angry at me for not being more resolute about the divorce. He suspected that I wasn't fully committed to him. He was right.

Even if I didn't love Len anymore, I still had feelings for B., no matter how hard I tried to kill them. In fact, there was nothing I wanted more at that moment than to see B., right then and there, on that snowed-in, blinding roof. To see him walk up the stairs and to rush into his arms, to feel his warmth, his smell—he smelled like cigarettes and hay—to move a wisp of his graying hair off his forehead and look into his eyes.

I had to stop! I really had to stop thinking about B.!

This was precisely why I had started seeing Victor in the first place, in a crazy, or perhaps crooked attempt to get over B. I've discovered that Victor wasn't perfect, far from it, but he was strong, extremely intelligent, and somewhat kind. A romantic self-made man, a Russian Great Gatsby. He was also very rich, have I mentioned that? I'm sure I have and I'm probably going to mention that again and again. Not because I'm proud of the fact of dating a rich man but because I still find it disturbing and even a little disgusting.

Victor promised to help me with the divorce, to come up with a fair solution for Len, to make sure that the kids stayed with me and that they were well provided for, that my mother had a decent home. All of that in exchange for a sincere assurance that I was going to be his loyal partner. I couldn't possibly deceive Victor. I could accept his help only if I felt that I could be that for him. He knew that I didn't love him yet—he didn't love me either—but he believed that love would develop with time, from our mutual affection and respect. My problem was that I doubted that. But maybe love wasn't necessary at all? I had married Len for love. I'd later experienced the most intense love for B. and look where it got me.

I was sitting on that roof, literally freezing my ass, while trying to persuade myself that I didn't need love and will myself into wanting to be with Victor, so I could go back and face him.

This was when my mother called to tell me about her colonoscopy results. "It's all good," she said. "No cancer!"

I said: "Okay."

"I thought you'd be relieved." She sighed.

At that moment, I didn't have any patience for hypochondria.

"I am not relieved, because I never thought you had cancer in the first place!" I said.

"But what about my symptoms?" she asked.

"Your symptoms are not real!" I screamed.

I said that. The words were out and gone, I immediately forgot about them, as if they had gone to some sort of memory landfill, but apparently that landfill wasn't very far or very deep, because when my mother got the correct diagnosis just a few months later, my words came right back to stay with me forever.

On the card dated December 10th, my mother wrote that her new book would have so-called "notes or asides to readers" that would try to engage them directly with the text. There were no examples in the following cards, but I imagine the notes were supposed to look something like this.

______________

Note to a reader about to scream at her mother that her symptoms are not real. Don't do it! You will never be able to forgive yourself. You hear me? Never!

______________

I ate the caviar at that desk, right out of the container, trying to justify eating it by telling myself that I couldn't afford to waste money, or that I simply needed it for nourishment, with my mother and my kids all depending on my strength at a time like this. It didn't work. I felt as if I were robbing a grave.

Writing this book often feels like that too.

From Divide Me By Zero by Lara Vapnyar. Used with the permission of the publisher, Tin House Books. Copyright © 2019 by Lara Vapnyar.