Miss Clarence All Alone

The woman still considers herself young at age 35—and acts like it. Single and childless, she spends her free time smoking and people-watching and pretending to read Stendhal at West Village cafés. She never imagined she would end up becoming an office drone when she first moved to New York more than a decade ago in search of a glamorous career in the arts. But here she is, earning enough to make ends meet and impress her relatives when they visit from upstate. Sometimes, though, she likes to imagine and even pretend that she is, in fact, married, perhaps with children soon to come. But no, for now she’s happily single and childless, and prefers the neatness and simplicity of her well-curated apartment.