“We were from different circles; would pass in corridors without so much as a glance, as though this conversation had never taken place. I see it now, among the girls I teach: the oil-and-water separation of types, hard to define and yet instinctively known. It’s a power one learns as a girl and never forgets: the ability to place one’s peers in their hierarchy with little more than a glance. Impressive, I suppose, in its own, cruel way.”
