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her experience. Then the warm aroma of something freshly baked rouses her, she opens her eyes and sees the young man in the next seat hungrily consuming his breakfast.
    "Real desire," she had tossed at her husband almost offhandedly as they were about to part, and it's still not clear to her what she'd had in mind, what compelled her to say it at the last minute. Was it to hurt him for not insisting on coming with her, even though she really had wanted to go alone, or was it to strengthen his longing for her, leaving him with hopes for her return? Yes, he's right. She was responsible for his frustration. He wanted to, he tried, but she, despite her willingness to give him the pleasure he craved, hadn't considered it quite fair for him to be satisfied while her own desire was blocked by anxiety over the trip, and in any case she had never found sex so important, either in her youth or in maturity, and certainly not now, as she ripens into the third phase of her life, yet she knows that her husband's love needs to be requited more often. It's just that she's not always able to focus her energies at the expense of her own desires and the need to be good to herself.
    She looks out the window. While she was sleeping the clouds broke into soft cottony tufts, and in the light of day she sees the desert plain kissing the gulf. Is this Africa? From her visit three years before, she remembers the arresting redness of the soil and the Africans wrapped in colorful fabrics walking upon it with barefoot grace. From the window of her brother-in-law's office, adjacent to the apartment where he housed them in violation of the rules—not only to save the cost of a hotel but also so they'd be together the whole time—she once saw her sister, early in the morning, buying milk and cheese from a plump African woman wearing a headdress with a flamboyant green feather. Daniela's heart reaches out now to her sister's slender silhouette, wrapped in an old woolen shawl she remembers from their parents' home.
    The photo album of her grandchildren has made its way while she slept to the feet of her neighbor, who is now unwittingly stepping on it. She politely asks him to pick it up; he apologizes, saying that he hadn't noticed. The stewardess, who is already clearing away empty trays, asks whether she would still like her breakfast, and after a moment's uncertainty she decides not to decline. But when she removes the aluminum cover from the main course and tastes the first bite, she feels a wave of nausea, like the ones she felt so many years ago at the beginnings of her pregnancies. Her husband is always ready and eager to finish off her leftovers, indeed expecting that his wife will always leave him something of hers, and so even when she wants to clean her plate, she restrains herself and leaves him something symbolic, as a concrete expression of her fidelity. But now there is no one to rescue her from this repellent meal. And she senses the gaze that lingers on her abandoned knife and fork. Would it be a gesture of friendship to offer a total stranger food she has already tasted? After all, if she were younger, perhaps a young man would try to get to know her over such a meal. She offers him the tray politely and cordially. The young man hesitates and blushes. He seems like a well-brought-up fellow who does not eat from the plate of strangers.
    "Why not eat it yourself? It's excellent..."
    "Please take it." And giving him no time for second thoughts, with a sure motherly hand she calmly shoves the tray his way before the stewardess can pounce and remove it to her cart.
    The young passenger grins with embarrassment, but the hunger of youth gets the best of him, and with sheepish care he wipes with a napkin the fork that has lately been in her mouth and plunges the knife into the omelet. She nods encouragingly, but does not want to commit herself to a chat occasioned by the odd kindness she has forced on him, and she therefore gathers up the