Paris, where Elf and Nic imagine living together, is a recurring imagined destination in the novel, joining Elfrieda Von Riesen and Nic’s private pleasures to the possibility of a life beyond their present circumstances. It remains a hope, not a completed move; its significance lies in how the sisters’ and narrator’s visions of the future gather around places they have not yet reached.

The Life They Imagine

The plan belongs to Elfrieda Von Riesen and Nic together. A laboratory in the city could give Nic a place to work, while the couple imagine speaking French, arguing about politics, wearing scarves all year, and taking comfort in old-world beauty. The details make their fantasy more than an escape to a name on a map: it is a picture of daily life shaped by work, shared tastes, and companionship. Yet they are still in Muddy Waters, which the narrator presents as a local counterpart in the Northwest Passage. The distance between their imagined home and their actual location remains unresolved.

A Place in Other Fantasies

The novel sets this shared plan beside the narrator’s own sudden daydream of escape. After hearing Radek speak about Elfrieda Von Riesen’s playing and suffering, Yolandi imagines falling in love with him and moving with Will and Nora to Prague. That fantasy belongs to a different possible life, organized around romance and a more intense, poetic existence; it does not mean the family goes to either city. The contrast places the couple’s recurring plan alongside Yolandi’s momentary invention of another future, showing how imagined destinations can hold desires that ordinary life has not settled.

A Name on the Telephone

Paris also enters a brief exchange with Claudio. When he says he is there, Yolandi repeats the name and stands for a moment dreaming of love; she then ends the call and returns to Elfrieda Von Riesen’s room. The passage gives the city a small but distinct role in Yolandi’s private imaginative life: a spoken place-name opens a romantic possibility, but the immediate action brings her back to her sister and the hospital.

The Future Reopened

Later, after waking with the feeling that she is a different person, Elfrieda Von Riesen says she is ready to do the tour, intends to call Claudio, and wants to play tennis again. She adds that perhaps she and Nic will move to Paris. The possibility resurfaces alongside concrete wishes and plans, so the city becomes one sign of a future she can again picture. Yolandi and their mother respond with a pause before Yolandi manages an enthusiastic reply. The move remains uncertain, framed by Elfrieda’s own perhaps, but its return marks a change: Paris is no longer only a standing dream for the couple; it is spoken again as part of the life Elfrieda may want.