First appeared in Lou Aronica, Betsy Mitchell and Amy Stout's Full Spectrum 4. Reprinted by Lawrence Schimel. Up for the Sturgeon, Hugo, Tiptree, and Locus awards.
Summary:
A minor character in someone else's story tries to make a space for her own story.
Discussion (Spoilers):
The best line about the story and about this life:
"all I know is the story I am in, and I don't know most of it. Just what I see from where I am."
The most moving lines about this story, these characters:
We dance and look up. "I ever saw clouds before," I say.
"Look closely," she says. "I think the story's almost over. You may never see them again." I turn on my elbow to her, but she is looking up at the sky. "You may never see me again, either."
"No!" I cry. "That can't happen--I've hardly seen you."
"Things end." Blue sky reflects in her eyes. "This has been the best part. With you."
The narrator writes her own story and is going to write another.
In this tale, like a number of hers, we readers begin displacement or confusion (what some call "estrangement"). In this case, it isn't difficult to follow, but the initial details don't create the actual reality--likely because the protagonist is learning as she goes along. I remark on this strategy as it's intriguing. Most genres want to ground you immediately. SF like confuse or pull the rug out from under the reader.
A compelling concept with limited results (necessarily so?). A lot of the details feel generic.
As a reader, it's hard to figure out what the main story was (that is, the story about the supposed male protagonist who is a minor character here). Perhaps something literary--some sort of tragedy although it isn't clear (his story in this story is even more generic than this story about minor characters). Probably not a spy thriller. In that case, the story would not have gone back so far unless it was cursorily told.
Even the specific details that do get told don't feel necessarily cohesive enough to build this story (that is, this story's protagonist), whatever limitations may be placed on it. This should have simmered a little longer on the stove.