"...Ipek laughed as if Ka had just told a very good joke, but before long her face turned deep red. During the long silence that followed, he looked into Ipek's eyes and realized that she saw right through him. So you couldn't even take the time to get to know me, her eyes told him. You couldn't even spend a few minutes flirting with me.
Don't try to pretend you came here because you always loved me and couldn't get me out of your mind. You came here because you found out I was divorced and remembered how beautiful I was and thought I might be easier to approach now that I was stranded in Kars.
By now Ka was so ashamed of his wish for happiness, and so determined to punish himself for his insolence, that he imagined Ipek uttering the cruelest truth of all: The thing that binds us together is that we have both lowered our expectations of life."
[from Pamuk, Orhan. Snow, New York: Vintage International, 2004, p. 38.]
