The postcard showed a sea so blue that Adnan thought someone had recolored it. The address was his; the name was not. It said the sender was enjoying her rest and had finally stopped buying souvenirs for people who disliked traveling. Adnan turned it over several times, searching for a legible enough signature to help. He found only the name Lana and a small drawing of sunglasses beside a coffee stain.
He took it to the post office. The worker recognized that the street number had been exchanged with the apartment number and said she would try to correct delivery. A week later a woman appeared at his door with the same postcard. It had been intended for her aunt, who was visiting and had dictated the address incorrectly. Lana brought chocolate to thank him for not discarding the card. Adnan said he had wanted to learn who these people needing no souvenirs were, since he belonged to that species himself.
Their doorway conversation lasted long enough for a neighbor to suggest they at least sit down. Lana admitted she was tired of turning travel into proof of an interesting life. She worked too much to afford vacations from which she returned more exhausted. Adnan had lived in the same neighborhood all his life and felt neither pride nor shame about it. He liked going somewhere for a good reason, and that year's reason was his sister's new baby in another city.
They went for coffee several days later. Lana expected him to urge her to travel less. Instead he asked where she had felt peaceful. She thought for a long time, then described an ordinary bench behind a bus station, far from the places she had photographed. Adnan showed her a similar bench in their own city, sheltered from traffic. They sat until dark and shared the chocolate she had brought for him, both with dirty fingers because it had begun melting.
The following month she traveled again, this time for only a few days and without a full schedule. She sent him a postcard with the correct address. On the back she wrote that he would like the soup in a small harbor restaurant and that she had bought him nothing. Adnan kept the card on a shelf. When she returned, he invited her to make the soup together, although neither knew the recipe. It tasted different from the original, but enough remained for tomorrow's lunch, which both considered a good reason to meet again.