It wasn’t that I’d been expecting a diploma or an invitation to dinner or anything like that, but this was my last session with Julius and I suppose I had hoped for something—something positive—a friendly smile or some words of encouragement, a hint of approval, a pat on the back. Even a glance would have been sufficient—the kind of wordless glance between fellow competitors that says, ‘Good game, well played, let’s call it a draw.’ But half an hour had passed without his having shown any particular signs of pleasure in my company and it didn’t look like he was going to show one now.

It was funny. There had been a time—it must have been during my last year at school—when I had toyed with the idea of going into the therapy business myself. Like so many others, I had imagined I might be rather good at dishing out sagelike advice to confused people at ridiculous prices. Then, I had learned that in order to be any sort of psychoanalyst or therapist or counsellor, you had to undergo analysis yourself—and that was the end of that dream. I didn’t want anyone putting my inner life under the microscope, thank you very much. In any case, it had never been my dream job. I had simply thought of it as a way of making a living while pursuing my real vocation—if it was a vocation, and not, as one person in particular had kindly had informed me, a sad, self-indulgent delusion.

And now here I was, having my own inner life put under a microscope. Well, at least I wasn’t paying for it.

This was happening not long after I had turned 23. To myself, how old I seemed: how experienced, how knowledgeable! Whereas, in reality, how naïve I was! How ignorant! How young!

As for the friendly smile or pat on the back—OK, I could live without them. The main thing was to get out of here in one piece. There couldn’t be much longer to go. Maybe Julius would end the session early. As it was, he seemed to have run out of things to say.

And then he leant back in his chair, fingered the silver earring that was so much a part of his personality, gave me a calm, appraising look, and ruined it all.