He clutched the master tape, running his fingers over it while the thoughts ran through his head. If he was to choose a man to be filmed having sex with his sister-in-law, whoever it was it couldn’t be him. He was all too aware of his wrinkled stomach, his love handles, his sagging buttocks and thighs.

He started the car, but instead of driving home he headed to a nearby sauna. He changed into the white T-shirt and shorts they gave him at the desk, and gazed, disillusioned, at his reflection in the mirror. There was no doubt about it: it couldn’t be him. But then who? Whom could he find to have sex with her? He wasn’t making a porn movie, nor was it enough for them to just feign the motions. He needed authenticity, and that meant actual penetration. But then who? Who would agree to such a thing? And how would his sister-in-law react?

He knew he had reached a point of no return. But he couldn’t stop now. No, he didn’t want to stop.

He tried to fall asleep in the sauna, his dangling limbs caressed by the warm steam. The place felt like being inside a summer night, time doubling back on itself. Enveloped by the warm radiance of that image, the only image that was forbidden him, all the energy drained from his exhausted body.

—

The first thing he saw when he woke from his brief sleep was her.

Her skin was a pale green. Her body lay prone in front of him, like a leaf that had just fallen from the branch, only barely begun to wither. The Mongolian mark was gone; instead, her whole body was covered evenly with that pale wash of green.

He turned her over onto her back. A dazzling light came from her naked body, making him squint, and he couldn’t see the area above her breasts—as though the source of the light was somewhere around her face. He spread her legs; her thighs parted with an ease that could only mean she was awake. A green sap, like that which oozes from bruised leaves, began to flow out from her vagina when he entered her. The acrid sweetness of the grass was so pungent he found it difficult to breathe. When he pulled out, on the point of climax, he saw that the whole of his penis was stained green. A blackish paste was smeared over his skin from his lower stomach to his thighs, a fresh sap which could have come from either her or him.

—

Once again he was on the phone to her, confronting silence on the other end of the line.

“Sister-in-law…”

“Yes.” Luckily, this time she answered without too long a pause. Did she sound like she was glad to hear from him? He wasn’t sure.

“Did you get a good rest yesterday?”

“Yes.”

“So, there’s something I wanted to ask you.”

“Go ahead.”

“Have you washed the flowers off?”