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“When the time was near, she was too weak to help herself. She was wasted away. I think it was cancer, though she never told me. She knew what happened to whores who died in Matushka’s house, and she didn’t want that to happen to her. I told her I’d take care of her, that I’d get her out of there or make it so Matushka didn’t find out until it was too late, but she said no. She said she’d only stayed so long because of me, and she didn’t want me to get into trouble. So the problem, as she saw it, wasn’t so much how to die, but how to leave a corpse too damaged for even the twisted tastes of one of Matushka’s special clients.” I want to put my hands over my ears now. I want to get out of this bed and run far, far away and hide. I thought I knew where he was going with this story only momen
- Writer
