He said (by Ellen Osborne)
He said:Are you afraid of dying alone?
And she wondered whether his intimacy had been grounded on this insecurity, whether love could be defined by fear. Desire for the sake of desire, because to desire was to be alive, to be distinct from people who had no direction. Those floating helpless, ambivalence a stranglehold.
She said: No, because I don't believe in death.
Silence. The quiet was a massed gathering of storms, of interrupted tidal waves. She could see his bright eyes, the milky reflection of blank windows.
Then he laughed.
What? - She was indignant.
Well I believe in loss.
Why?
I am always on the brink of losing everything.
She was silent. She hated it when he tried to be a poet; there was something ugly about his affected enthusiasm, something frustrating in his flattery. The purpose she had felt in his pursuit was now forced. Old, like the stale cereal or darkened coffee rings found on his tables. She regretted it all. Lust was a sordid flash of electric light.
Everyone is on the brink of losing. Nobody is really sure of anything. We think we have some hold over our lives, the people we know, even our lovers. But we don't. She said this to shut him up.
They were facing the ceiling together on white sheets, hands spread and separated. And then he leant over her, desperate, aloof. She smelt that cloying scent.
Please, he said.
[The short short story comp is announced and explained here.]