Summary

“The First Week” takes place in Cambridge, Massachusetts during September of 1996. Selin arrives at Mather, her residence at Harvard. She checks her email to see if Ivan wrote her. They last saw each other in a parking lot in Budapest, where he “held [her] so close to him” (10). There are no new messages from him. Selin sees that he is online at Berkeley, California.

Svetlana arrives on campus the next day. She inquires whether Selin and Ivan slept together. Selin replies in the negative. They spent many nights together just talking at his parents’ house. Selin reflects that she would have slept with Ivan, despite her virginity and general indifference to sex. Selin worries about sex since she never succeeds in inserting tampons.

Svetlana tells Selin about her visit to Belgrade which went well for the most part...