THE TWENTY-SEVENTH
He went into the half-empty bar, where everything was slowly winding down, and he suddenly felt so good — as if reawakening to life after lying dead for a long time. As if awakening from that cacophony of people and things, which still, for some nonsensical reason, has to be kept going. That race of dead things, dead thoughts and feelings. How is it possible for us all to die like that, and yet keep moving about? If only we had died completely — back then at the twilight of the old régime. With one brave leap — like that dark-haired girl who tore herself out of the gendarmes’ hands and flung herself down on the sharp rocks. At least then we’d be lying in a grave at the wall somewhere without a cross, a rare topic for social ballads. But this way…
He took note of the ta
