Summary

In “The Fallow Years,” Irina ignores Jamie’s emails, still trying to find the best photos to send. She returns to the archive, remembering the past.

After killing the boy, Irina “stopped taking photos of boys,” “stopped fucking,” and “stopped leaving the flat” (246). When she began photographing “women wearing clothes,” her professors thought she was regressing (246). Irina “didn’t care” (246). She stopped attending classes and “didn’t go to graduation” (246).

Unable to work, she moved home. She got the bar gig. She worked, partied, slept, and repeated. When she finds the image of a man from her “post-London work,” she recalls how she returned to photography (246). She invited him over and the shoot went well. They did not touch “and nothing bad happened” (248). Everything had been fine since then, until Eddie.

In “29,” Irina’s friends throw her a 29th birthday...