She burst out laughing loudly, too loudly. Swiftly, in a second, she laughed herself to some unseen edge, stumbled and fell over.⁠ ⁠… Silence.

She stood up, put her hands upon my shoulders and looked into me for a long while. Then she pulled me toward her and everything seemed to have disappeared save her sharp, hot lips.⁠ ⁠…

“Goodbye.”

The words came from afar, from above, and reached me not at once, only after a minute, perhaps two minutes later.

“Why⁠ ⁠… why ‘goodbye’?”

“You have been ill, have you not? Because of me you have committed crimes. Has not all this tormented you? And now you have the Operation to look forward to. You will be cured of me. And that means⁠—goodbye.”

“No!” I cried.