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Then we hear his wife’s cheerful voice explaining to him as
she drains the pasta, “Yes, but that was different; now she
doesn’t care if she dies!” So we book the first deal we can
find and immediately change subjects and start talking
about the spa.
My friend brings out the list of available treatments and
reads them, “Hydrotherapy Immersion Bath. It’s like a
bubble bath with essential oils, but under water.”
“And do they drown you?” I ask.
“Yes, but there’s an extra charge for that,” she replies and
continues. “Eucalyptus bath, petal bath, salt bath; wow—
blood bath, now you might find that one interesting.”
And in this way, the miraculous power of words triumphs
over action. Through the use and abuse of words you
distance yourself from the idea of suicide, and it grows
smaller and smaller. It’s true that it lingers there for a
while, in the background. Protective. But every time the
oven makes an appearance and you haven’t put your head
in it, you have one more reason to laugh at yourself. What
is it that separates the suicides that haven’t been carried
out (always a bit pathetic, even comical) from the ones that
have been (which, in contrast to the first, leave you in a
state of infinite dismay)? What exactly is the distance that
separates them, so small yet so immense? What is that
step? According to my friend the expert, it’s that moment