Yevgeny Zamyatin — We [1027]

Shrunk into a little ball below, on the cold stair, and I bend over her, stroking her head, her face—my hands are wet. As though I were very big, and she—altogether tiny—a tiny part of my own self. — Yevgeny Zamyatin, We, 1027

Note

The protective, almost maternal tenderness the narrator feels toward O provides a striking emotional contrast to the clinical coldness of the One State.