Miss Frumkin rummaged through her bag looking for a spoon. She seemed to be aware that there was no spoon in the bag, but she insisted on rummaging anyway. Finding no spoon, she took out her toothbrush and began to eat the yogurt with the toothbrush. Miss O’Reilly laughed at her. Miss Frumkin didn’t seem to mind. “They laughed at Bell and they laughed at Edison,” she said, throwing the toothbrush into the wastebasket. She finished eating the yogurt with her fingers.

As he spoke, Miss Frumkin looked at her chart, which was directly in front of Dr. Sun, facing him. Reading upside down is one of Miss Frumkin’s talents. It has enabled her, over the years, to read many things not intended for her eyes.

she was counting the brushstrokes when she brushed her teeth — on the rare days that she did brush her teeth.

She spent the night there, engaging in behavior of a particularly primitive kind, and had to be showered the next morning.