Selin returns to Harvard for her sophomore year, still emotionally recovering from her confusing pseudo-relationship with Ivan.

Selin reads 'The Seducer's Diary' in Kierkegaard's Either/Or and is alarmed by how closely it parallels Ivan's behavior toward her.

After watching The Usual Suspects for class, Selin sends Ivan a lengthy email demanding an explanation of his confusing behavior.

Svetlana urges Selin to see a therapist after noticing how distressed Selin becomes over her literary analysis.

Ivan's ex-girlfriend Zita calls Selin to reveal that Ivan had been living with his girlfriend Eunice throughout the entire previous year.

During Zita's phone call, Selin's mother calls on the other line to reveal she has cancer and has had a double mastectomy.

Selin goes home for Thanksgiving and her mother recommends she see a psychiatrist about her persistent unhappiness.

Selin begins taking a low dose of Zoloft after her psychiatrist agrees to prescribe it at her mother's suggestion.

At a literary magazine party hosted by Lakshmi, Selin has her first sexual encounter with a man whose name she cannot remember.

Selin emails a man she privately calls 'the Count' to explicitly propose sex; he calls immediately and she follows through.

Selin is hired by Let's Go to write a Turkey travel guide and separately receives a grant to study abroad in Russia.

Selin arrives in Ankara to stay with her grandmother and begins her Let's Go research, exploring the city's museums and nightlife.

Selin meets a Turkish man named Mesut while researching remote towns and becomes emotional when the time comes to leave him.

While preparing to leave Turkey, Selin reads Henry James's The Portrait of a Lady and finds parallels to her own writing philosophy.

Selin arrives in Moscow and realizes this is the first journey she has ever undertaken entirely of her own choosing.

Selin returns to Harvard after a confusing summer in Hungary and immediately struggles with the aftermath of her pseudo-relationship with Ivan. Her discovery that Ivan had been living with another woman while stringing her along sends her into a deepening depression throughout the fall. With her mother's guidance, Selin seeks psychiatric treatment and begins medication that gradually lifts her mood. As spring arrives, she begins to experiment socially and sexually, trying to move on from Ivan and live the 'aesthetic life' she has been reading about. She secures professional writing work with Let's Go and spends her summer traveling through Turkey, continuing to grow and experiment. The novel closes with Selin arriving in Moscow, feeling a sense of freedom and authenticity she has never experienced before.

The headline events of Selin's sophomore year and Turkish summer.

Selin and Svetlana browse the course catalogue and Selin is immediately drawn to Kierkegaard's Either/Or on the reading list.

A Virginia Woolf lecture devolves into a screaming match over whether Woolf had read Bergson and ends early.

Selin and Svetlana formally declare their majors: Selin chooses literature, while Svetlana chooses history and literature.

Selin learns from Peter, the Hungary program director, that Ivan is studying at Berkeley and has multiple romantic entanglements.

Selin applies to join the literary magazine staff at Lakshmi's encouragement and is accepted.

Selin takes a data entry job for a gardening catalogue but quits after the work causes shooting wrist pain.

Selin finds a new position doing data entry at the Ukrainian Research Center on campus.

Selin and Svetlana use a mnemonic device taught by Svetlana's father to memorize a long passage from Pushkin's Eugene Onegin.

Selin reads Andre Breton's Nadja and is disappointed by his dismissal of transforming real people into fictional characters.

Selin reads Freud's Dora: An Analysis of a Case of Hysteria and finds its portrayal of manipulation disturbingly familiar.

Selin accidentally sends Ivan a half-formed cryptic email and he responds that he forgives her.

A classmate recommends Martin Amis's The Rachel Papers, which Selin reads and dislikes for its protagonist's cruelty toward a woman.

Selin and Lakshmi spend winter break in Martha's Vineyard, staying with two Swedish twins they meet upon arrival.

Selin's writing seminar class analyzes Chekhov's 'The Lady With the Little Dog,' which prompts her to email Ivan about her experiences.

Selin stays in a treehouse by the sea in Olympos, her final stop before departing for Moscow.

Selin's sophomore year is shaped by a series of academic and social choices that gradually reveal her values and character. She declares her major, joins the literary magazine, and finds campus employment while navigating the persistent gap between formal education and her own deeply personal approach to literature. Her reading list—from Breton to Freud to Chekhov—consistently fails to satisfy her professors' analytical expectations but proves illuminating on a personal level. The fallout from her relationship with Ivan lingers in small, telling moments, from a tip from Peter to an accidentally sent email. A winter break trip with Lakshmi signals a slow return to herself, and by summer she is deep in Turkey researching for Let's Go, spending her final nights before Moscow in a treehouse by the sea.

The secondary events that shape Selin's academic and social world.

Selin finds Ivan's prize-winning senior thesis in the library but cannot parse its pages of mathematical symbols.

Ivan responds to Selin's lengthy, emotional email about his behavior with only a cryptic, poorly-written poem.

Selin becomes so excited during a class lecture on realism and Surrealism that she has to leave the room early.

While treating Svetlana's lice after a Halloween party, Selin asks whether it would simply be easier to date women than men.

Selin tries to chat online with Ivan but discovers the person using his email address is actually his ex-girlfriend Zita.

Selin notices Ivan is on campus and realizes he must be there to visit his girlfriend Eunice, not to see her.

While home for Thanksgiving, Selin finds her high school copy of Eugene Onegin and realizes her first love was her Russian violin teacher.

Selin's mother takes her to a Picasso exhibit and suggests she ask her psychiatrist specifically about medication.

Selin's psychiatrist asks whether she thinks men find her attractive, and she cries on every train ride home from his office.

The morning after her first sexual encounter, Selin reflects that the aesthetic life seems to be designed for men, not women.

Ivan emails Selin that she is 'graceful in writing and clumsy in life' after she describes her recent romantic attempts.

Let's Go editors assign Selin to Turkey rather than Russia because her Turkish is far stronger than her Russian.

While exploring Ankara's nightlife for Let's Go, Selin discovers her family has arranged for Turkish intelligence to follow her.

In Antalya, Selin pushes away a man named Koray, locks herself in the bathroom, and discovers she has a UTI.

Selin's luggage is lost upon arriving in Moscow; holding only her messenger bag, she feels lighter than air.

Pool 3 traces the moments of discovery and decision that most profoundly shift Selin's understanding of herself and the people around her. Early revelations about Ivan—his impenetrable thesis, his evasive poem, the unmasking of Zita—gradually expose the true nature of his deception and Selin's own capacity for self-delusion. Her growing awareness that the 'aesthetic life' is structured for men rather than women, her realization that her first love predated Ivan entirely, and her troubled experiences with psychiatric care all represent pivotal internal turning points. Her summer in Turkey forces a reckoning with her complicated Turkish identity, from being surveilled by her own family to a frightening encounter in Antalya. The pool closes with Selin's arrival in Moscow, where a lost suitcase becomes an unexpected symbol of the freedom she has at last found.