Lydia Davis is smoking marijuana by herself at a coffee shop. A man sitting next to her says something. "English," she says. "Is everything ok?" he says. "Great," she says. The man writes something on the back of a receipt and hands it to her. Lydia Davis looks at it. "What am I supposed to do with this?" she says. "I don’t know," the man says. The man gives Lydia Davis his email address. His email address is "raymondcarver@gmail.com". Lydia Davis tries to look unaffected while mentally projecting her face looking very excited. Lydia Davis smiles a little. She has feelings of victory. She thinks about feeling victory and has feelings of defeat.

Lydia Davis goes home and emails the man. "Are you Raymond Carver?" she writes. Raymond Carver replies two weeks later with two paragraphs about a wedding, a trip to the United Kingdom, a kitten, and an international DJ. Lydia Davis feels very excited. Lydia Davis wants to wait two weeks to reply, but she emails Raymond Carver immediately after reading his email, which she notices is 43 minutes after Raymond Carver sent his email. Lydia Davis writes things about kittens, then asks if he wants to get coffee with her tomorrow. Raymond Carver replies a month later. "You should call me," it says, with an American cell phone number. Two weeks later, Lydia Davis text messages Raymond Carver, "I'll call you soon." After that Lydia Davis avoids all means of contact with Raymond Carver.