Often, in the evening, before falling asleep, I would think about the young guard. I drew on the little I’d been able to guess: in another life, he’d have come and sat beside me, he’d have asked me to dance and told me his name. I’d have had a name which I’d have told him, and we’d have talked. Then, if we were attracted to each other, we’d have walked hand in hand. Maybe I wouldn’t have found him interesting: he was the only one of our six jailers who wasn’t old and decrepit, and I was probably indulgent because I’d never met any other young men. I tried to imagine our conversation, in a past that I hadn’t known: Will it be fine again tomorrow? Have you seen next door’s kittens? I hear your aunt’s going on holiday … but I’d never seen kittens and I had absolutely no idea what fine weather might be, which put an end to my reverie. Then I’d think about kissing, imagining the guard’s mouth as precisely as I could. It was quite wide, with well-defined, thinnish lips—I didn’t like the full lips that some of the women had. I pictured my lips drawing close to his: there was probably something else I needed to know, because I felt nothing in particular.

But then, one evening, instead of falling asleep from the boredom of trying to imagine a kiss that would never happen, I suddenly remembered that the women had spoken of interrogations, saying they were surprised that there’d never been any. I embellished the little they’d said: I imagined the guards coming to fetch one of the women, taking her away screaming and terrified. Sometimes, the woman was never seen again, sometimes she’d be flung back among us in the morning, covered in burns, injured, moaning, and would not always survive. I thought: ‘Ha! If there were interrogations, he’d come and get me and I’d leave this room where I’ve always lived. He’d drag me along unknown corridors, and then something would happen!’

My mind worked incredibly fast: the boy was propelling me along with seeming dedication to his job, but, once we rounded the corner and were out of sight, he stopped, turned to me, smiled and said: ‘Don’t be afraid.’ And then he took me in his arms and an immense sensation surged through me, an overwhelming eruption, an extraordinary burst of light exploding inside me. I couldn’t breathe—and then I breathed again, because it was desperately brief.

After that, my mood changed. I no longer tried to persuade the women to tell me their secrets; I had my own. The eruption proved difficult to achieve. I had to tell myself stories that became increasingly long and complicated but, to my utter dismay, I never experienced that explosion twice in a row, whereas I wished it could have lasted for hours. I wanted to feel that sensation all the time, day and night, swaying deliciously, like the rare patches of grass on the plains caressed by the gentle breeze that blew for days at a time, but which I didn’t see until much later.