"Lucile looked at him with consternation. Now it was all coming back to her, what they had talked about the night before. Together, they had concluded that Lucile's life was no life at all, and that she had to find something to do. With great gusto she had welcomed the idea of working, and she'd even painted a rosy picture of herself at some newspaper scrambling slowly but steadily toward the top, becoming one of those brilliant female journalists who were the talk of the town in Paris; undoubtedly she would have a lot of work and a lot of worries, but deep down she felt sure she had enough tenacity, humor and ambition to make it. They would have a very swanky apartment paid for by the newspaper, since they would have to throw so many parties, but every year they would escape for at least a month, sailing on the balmy Mediterranean.
She had enthusiastically spun out this glowing image before Antoine last night, who at first had been skeptical but then had gradually warmed up to it, for after all, no one was more persuasive than Lucile when she got to talking about her plans, especially when they were as hare-brained and as unlike herself as this one was. What in the world had she drunk or read last night that had gotten her spinning such a crazy tale? The fact was, she had no more ambition than she had tenacity, and no greater interest in having a career than in killing herself."
Francoise Sagan, La Chamade
