The Expats

The best hiding spots are not the most hidden; they're merely the least searched.

It was impossible to understand how brief it is. It seemed like youth would last so long; it would last forever. But it's just a blink.

And everyone's in the same situation, basically: we're all finding our separate ways, together.

People who were too outgoing made her suspicious. She couldn't help but presume that all the loud noise was created to hide quiet lies.

But she was still operating on lonely-person principles, still worried that her happiness could be wrenched away at any moment, for reasons out of her control.

Travel wasn't fun if you didn't get to see or do what you wanted; it was merely a different type of work, in a different place.

This is the expat life: you never know when someone you see every day is going to disappear forever, instantly transmogrifying into a phantom. Before long you won’t be able to remember her last name, the color of her eyes, the grades that her children were in. You can’t imagine not seeing her tomorrow. You can’t imagine you yourself being one of those people, someone who one day just vanishes. But you are.

But all people have secrets. Part of being human is having secrets, and being curious about other people's secrets. Dirty fetishes and debilitating fascinations and shameful defeats and ill-begotten triumphs, humiliating selfishness and repulsive inhumanity. The horrible things that people have thought and done, the lowest points in their lives.

She understood that he had to work, and he had to travel. But what he didn't have to do was be absent even when he was present.

Once you see some things, you can never forget them. If you don't want to have to see them for the rest of your life, it's better not to look in the first place.

So my sister, she slipped through the cracks of the disaster of our family. She became her own disaster.

It's impossible to know which parts of the woman, if any, were real.

But Kate was wide awake, chased by the same demon that haunted her regularly, especially when she was trying to forget it.

A waiter visited to find out if everything was okay. A preposterous question.

Each of those photos proves a different thing. All those things add up to the truth.

After all, she herself had done the very worst thing imaginable. And she was a good person. Wasn’t she?

They are permanent tourists, in Paris. Their life is a certain type of dream come true.

But quitting didn't change what she'd already done. The piece of her past that she'd never be able to outrun.

You talking about computer weaknesses?" "Yes. But also human weaknesses." "Meaning what?" "Meaning the types of weaknesses that make humans let down their guard. Trust people they shouldn't trust." "You're talking about manipulating people." "Yes." Dexter and Lester were staring at each other. "I guess I am.

So she forgave him. And instead she berated herself for her suspicion, for her snooping. For the things she promised herself she wouldn't do, the feelings she wouldn't have.

Plus she had to admit that a small part of her secrecy was that she was holding something back, for herself. If she never told Dexter the truth, she was still reserving the right to return to her old life. To one day be a covert operative again. To be a person who could keep the largest secrets from everyone, including her husband, forever.

She began to sacrifice that old identity to live in her new one. It was the new life, after all, that everyone wanted.

She was not in a position to complain about this life, not yet. Probably not ever.

She needed friends, and a life, and this is how you acquired those things: by talking to strangers. Everyone was a stranger, all on equal footing in strangerhood.

Because when people are transferring millions of dollars, they don’t simply hit the Send button on their computer. They’re also on the phone with a bank officer, confirming the transaction. The customer creates the transaction detail, then the bank officer executes the transfer. This is how banks prevent fraud.

You can’t have the money.” Kate says. The dark red wine has already spread through the cloth, tendrils reaching out through the fibers from the pool. That same pattern, again. “But if you move fast, you can have your freedom.

But there’s this giant deception at the foundation of their relationship, their happiness. This impure motive. There was that small mistake that the woman made, uttering the wrong number. And then the man reconstructed an entire intrigue, a big thick plot— a seduction and affair and relationship and marriage proposal, a whole life— around her error and his notice of it. Taking advantage of her lie. But does that make their relationship less real? Does that make it impossible that they genuinely love each other?

She knows that one of the most dangerous, self-destructive indulgences is to go around proving how smart you are. It’s the type of thing that gets people shot.

Dexter was too legit,” Julia continued. “His life was too verifiable, too aboveboard. He was nobody’s spy, nobody’s mole, nobody’s rat. He was who he is. And he didn’t know that you weren’t.