In the basement of their house is a trunk big enough to fit a small woman. Gigi used to sit in the trunk to read. She liked the feeling of being in a boat but didn't like being near the water. Water seems so deceptive, too unstable in its tide, in its flux. This, her lover recognized as Gigi's aversion to change. He saw it in her sullenness every time they were made to travel for his research. Even moving his study table to the window became something of an expedition. The chaise longue would now be perpendicular to the wall instead of flushed against it. Its back would exposed. You couldn't enjoy sitting it in, and still have the morning light when it was sheer. "It looked like the makara," her lover says, thinking back to how their previous homes looked, each one having the same furniture but rearranged for economy. "Do you see how the Indians saw it? This shape-shifter? It sometimes had a snake's tail, even the head and legs of a crocodile." Gigi smiled at how she had a tantrum over the chaise longue those years ago, how these little things riled her. She'd used the length of her leg to push the chaise longue back to where it belonged, and shouted: "Then leave the dragon where it's supposed to be. And you can take your makara and myths to Kashmir or Nepal or Java and wherever else you decide to go to. See you in the fall!" Her lover looked away, the chaise longue in an awkward position somewhere between the window and the study table. "The makara myth did spread that far," he muttered under his breath. "All the way to Indo-China, not that it'd matter to you."