Alya is the friend-of-a-friend. Born in Belarus, she immigrated to the United States at age 19 with fifty bucks in her pocket and not a drop of English-speaking ability to her name. Today, she lives in the 8th arrondissement of Marseille, a quiet and aging suburb nestled between the sea and the mountains. Her fiancé, Nico, was born and raised there, so every single person knows who they are, and their dog — Pushkin — is regularly referred to as their “son.” We run into Nico’s father at a coffee shop at 11am, where he has come to sober up after a morning spent working on his boat. It’s an agreement he has with his wife. Six days a week, he’ll do whatever she says and be as sober as a the ring of a church bell. But on Saturdays, fuck all. Nico looks at me knowingly when he says this. “In France,” he says. “Men like to talk big, but it’s the women who hold their balls.”