Her tone was calm and normal. She was asking an ordinary question and would happily listen to the answer and then think of something else. Surely such a lack of interest in her own concerns could only be a sign of impending death?
The women had only ever called me ‘child’, and even now that I’ve been alone for such a long time, and because I have no other name, I still have a vague feeling that I am the youngest, even though there is no one left with whom to compare my age. I thought back to the days when I’d been furious and full of contempt, when I’d had the impression that they were laughing at me, that I knew nothing and they knew everything, and I found it heart-rending to see that Laura was now consulting me as if I were an oracle. She just stood there, not knowing what to do with her body.
‘Do you feel ill?’
I had been so slow to reply that she must have forgotten her question. She looked taken aback, struggled to think, and nodded.
‘I’m tired. But everyone’s tired, aren’t they?’
Everyone: the two of us.
‘Yes, everyone,’ I replied calmly.
If she didn’t remember that everyone was dead, why remind her?
The fire had got going. I put on the logs, covered it and picked up a saucepan. I chose two cans containing tomato soup. Anthea had taught me to read the labels and I was delighted to discover that they were the kind that contained little meatballs. Laura stood beside me, as if she couldn’t think what else to do. Her legs seemed unsteady. It wasn’t very obvious, and I wasn’t certain. I told myself at first it was her disorientated air that made me think that, but since she stopped living shortly afterwards, it’s likely that she was finding it hard to stay on her feet. I led her gently to a chair at the big table, sat her down and placed a bowl and glass in front of her.
‘We’ll be eating in a few minutes.’
‘If you like,’ she replied.
I looked at her carefully. Her face was utterly devoid of expression and it was probably my own anxiety that made me think she looked lost. Her eyes had a glazed look and her arms dangled by her sides. I wanted to place them in her lap, but that reminded me of the gesture I’d made so often, crossing the arms of a dead woman on her chest, and then closing her eyes, so I held back. But at the same time I was certain she was dying.
Like that, on her feet, without being ill? It wasn’t her body that was giving up, but her spirit, which had grown increasingly weary of animating those muscles, of making that heart beat, of going through all the motions of living, the spirit that nothing had nourished for such a long time, that had watched its sisters die and that had for its only companion a woman who disliked her and whom she disliked. How tragic! I said to myself. How tragic! She had, in the past, lived out twenty or twenty-five years of her legitimate destiny, and then crazy events had taken place and she’d entered a world of absurdity, surrounded by strange women who were as confused as she was. Despite all that, she had tried to love. I thought of Alice, a lively, impatient woman, who used to say to me: ‘Go away and play!’ when I disturbed her and then apologised. They’d lived together in a little house. They argued noisily and made up again with great promises: you had to do something to pass the time. I sat down in front of Laura, I sincerely wanted to say some helpful words that would sustain her, but, to be honest, in this sterile land, in the silence and the solitude, ignorant and sterile myself, what could I give her? Why should she want to live? We were doing nothing, we were going nowhere, we were nobody.
‘You see,’ I said to her, ‘I want to go off exploring. I don’t want to end my days here, eating canned food only for it to come out again later.’
She looked up. You could see she was trying very hard to understand what I was talking about. Then, to help her, I said:
‘I’m going off exploring.’
‘But there’s nothing,’ she said, surprised. ‘Only the bunkers.’
Thinking was a great effort for her.
‘There aren’t even any seasons.’
‘We don’t know. We gave up too soon. We only searched for two years, didn’t we?’
‘That was because of the old women. We had to keep stopping so they could die in peace. And sometimes they took such a long time. They kept feeling better and we thought they’d recover.’
‘I want to leave. I’m not old.’
‘Wait,’ she said. ‘Wait. I shan’t be long.’
She understood me. We both knew that she couldn’t cope on her own, that she wouldn’t have the strength to go and get food from the bunkers or gather enough wood for her fire, and that I couldn’t abandon her.
The soup was hot. We ate in silence, then I went to wash up in the river. When I returned, she was sitting on the bench again, waiting for me. She’d sit then until she felt sleepy and then would go and lie down on her mattress to sleep. While asleep, she’d be waiting to wake up.
I didn’t want her to die, but how could I have wanted her to live? Several times during the afternoon, I felt a tremor of impatience. I was overjoyed at the idea that I was going to be free. To calm my excitement, I began working out what I’d need. I’d take one of the big bags and pack enough provisions for two weeks, two blankets – because I’d grown used to sleeping on a mattress and I was afraid I’d find the ground too hard. Later, when I’d adjusted, one blanket would be enough and my load would be lighter. I’d need lots of matches, a small shovel and boots. I must remember to take some soap. My dress was in complete tatters, but I’d be bound to find some fabric and thread, because I’d regularly come across bunkers with fresh supplies. I’d have to make sure I found the right size boots if I wanted to walk a long way. In the past, I’d had the unpleasant experience of blisters, and for years, I’d been living in sandals. We’d never found any socks and the skin of my feet had become soft, but I knew it would soon harden.
I bustled about, devoting myself happily to the too few domestic tasks, and my mind busied itself planning the route. I kept going over the list of things I needed to take, enumerating, repeating, summarising, to the point where I began to feel very irritable. Soon I’d have done everything it was possible to do: the floor was swept, the mattresses turned, the blankets shaken, there was nothing left to wash or put away. I went out and sat on a chair facing Laura. She was staring at the sky, at the point where the sun would set later, and her gaze was more vacant, more absent than ever. Her breathing was even. Her hands were once again resting on her thighs palms upturned, and I could see a tiny artery pulsing on the outside of her wrist. It was regular, clear and strong. That’s why I don’t think she died of a physical illness, but that she abandoned her unflagging body which would have carried on for years, except for her eyes. She heard me coming, muttered a few words, so softly that I didn’t understand, but I didn’t feel like asking her to repeat them. What could she have to say to me? What did we have of the slightest interest to tell each other? That it was a fine day, that it was unlikely to rain that night, that the sun was going down? She was no more interested in telling me than I was in hearing it, and most likely she’d only attempted to speak to me out of politeness, to show that she was glad of my company, which was probably not entirely true. What could I give her, other than food and drink, which would only prolong an existence she no longer desired?
‘Yes, of course,’ I said.
That satisfied her. We were in agreement, without being too sure over what. Or perhaps over the fact that we had nothing in common. And so we sat in silence.
I didn’t watch the sky. I was fascinated by Laura. She seemed to be disappearing inside herself, withdrawing further and further. At first, there was still some expression on her face, the ghost of the smile she’d given to welcome me, a hint of weariness, a faint grimace when an insect settled on her hand. She didn’t budge, I brushed the creature away but she seemed oblivious. The setting sun illuminated her face. There was no shadow, nothing to see except for skin, taut over tissue that was still living, a live model, with peaks and troughs, different from those of a plain or a hill, that the eyes could explore but without learning anything other than their configuration. I could have touched her, for sure, run my hands over her cheeks, but would she have felt it? There was a moment when everything was as if suspended. I could see clearly that the little artery in her wrist was still beating, but I was certain that Laura was dead. Her breathing was soft and regular, with an automatic rhythm that was unable to stop, but she was no longer thinking. In the past, Anthea had explained what an electroencephalogram was: Laura’s would have been flat. Sitting on the bench, gazing towards the setting sun, she lost her mind in the cerebral convolutions, the mysterious nooks and crannies of the memory, she had gone backwards, seeking a world that made sense, losing her way among the labyrinths, slowly deteriorating, dimming, noiselessly being obliterated and then fading away so gradually that it was impossible to pinpoint the transition between the flickering little flame and the shadows. As the sun touched the horizon, her wrist stood out clearly in the evening light and I saw that there was no more movement under her white skin. I let out a deep sigh. My last tie had been cut.