THOME’S FATHER

He is lying in bed, watching TV. He needs a few minutes before he realizes that what he’s watching isn’t the eighty-ninth episode of The Walking Dead, that series financed by neoliberals, but rather a live report from the north of the country. The sweating man has really done top-shelf work.

Thome’s father needs to call him straightaway. But

THE SWEATING MAN

Doesn’t really hear the phone ring clearly. The call reaches him just as he is

Tying a scarf to the radiator, putting his neck into the loop, and forcing his body to defy its will to survive. Yes, and it’s true that during the fight, flush with hormones, he sees his life flash before his eyes, a life that had been made up of nothing. Hanging oneself on an object near ground level, like a doorknob or pipe valve, demands a strong will. At the very least. My goodness was it torture, this living, when you wanted nothing more than the respect of alpha males, who had never accepted you, how bleak is it when you can’t love? And when he, the sweating man, had ever fallen in love, it had always been short-lived and ended with him sitting helplessly at a table with a woman, drinking tea, and at some point she would always say, “Take your jacket with you when you go.” At least he has a strong will, the sweating man, who hears the phone ring in the midst of his death throes and in his fading consciousness pictures the ringing of the bells of heaven.

Nice images

Viewed by

THOME’S FATHER

In a BBC special called The Poor: How Much Do They Threaten Our Prosperity?

He straightens his blanket. Turns down the sound so his Russian hooker doesn’t wake up, and follows the special broadcast delightedly.

In a talk show format the problems caused by the poor are outlined. They hinder growth of a recovery, they lead crime statistics (which never include white-collar crime). The basic income could be 50 percent higher for “normal citizens” if payments to degenerates were stopped.

The next program up is on child gangs.

The enlightenment of the people is bearing fruit. A homeless shelter in Blackpool is burned down. Fifty-seven people die. There’s an expression of so-called official regret, not, however, without a relativizing comment by the prime minister that of course one must be aware of what one triggers among other, working people with one’s lifestyle—

And now

DON

Has completely lost her way in her book.