Woman breasts?

I pulled on my vest. It was soaking wet. I was soaking wet.

‘But when I stripped all the ivy off the old mulberry this afternoon,’ she continued, ‘moments before I was stung, I thought I saw it there – the number. Etched deep into the bark.’

She grinned. ‘You probably think I’m stark, staring mad, Mr Huff!’

‘You?’ I echoed. Although I meant me, obviously. The you that was me. Her you. Me.

‘But no matter what we happen to think of each other,’ she chuntered on, doggedly, ‘the fact is that we do actually have something important in common: neither of us really wants to take this thing any further.’

‘This?’ I echoed.

Thing?

‘This story.’ She frowned. ‘This situation. And for our own perfectly good reasons, too. Neither of us truly believes, for starters. At least you won’t. And I can’t. Neither of us really wants to engage. You find the whole thing ridiculous – all of it, all of us. I just want to … to erase it …’ – she shuddered – ‘to keep my head down. To quietly get on with things. Because I simply can’t … I can’t give anything more to it, Mr Huff. I won’t surrender to it. Not again. I just … No. No. I can’t. I’ve suffered enough. In my own, very shallow way. And I suppose I’ve grown – without even realizing it – I’ve grown very … very cynical about it all. About everything. Same as you have. Same as you are. So that’s … that’s another thing we share – another thing we both have in common, Mr Huff.’

I pondered this for a while – this professed commonality between us – as I pulled on my underpants, my eyes – my vision – swimming with a succession of giant, orange-yellow blotches. And the urge to look upwards! It was so strong! Away from the … into the … Oh! Up into the …

When did I last breathe? Was I still breathing?

‘Gotta go,’ I whispered, but it sounded horribly like, ‘You were her nurse?’

(Is it … Is it possible to say two things at once? To project two, diametrically opposed impulses in a single linguistic thrust?)

‘No. No.’ She shook her head. ‘Not her nurse. No. I just … I sat with her. I was just a student back then. I sat with her at night. And on some days.’

Oh God. I honestly think she would tell me everything! Everything! But would it matter? Does it matter? Here? Now? Is it …? If I could only … If I could simply … but the … I grabbed my glasses out of my sock. A feeling of such powerful, such intense and unspeakable claustrophobia enveloped me in that moment. I really had to leave. I really needed to leave, before …

Right now.

Yes.

Right then.

Yes.

Right this/that minute.

‘So she was very ill by that stage?’ I garbled.

Was I trying to kill myself?!