Trafika Europe 2 - Polish Nocturne

vitamins, presumably because she had a poor diet, she suffered from chronic headaches and an acid stomach. She was afraid of getting old and of cracked fingernails. A working woman who had more money than time, who bought expensive olive oil soaps in little boutiques and didn’t get around to using them, and new toothbrushes before she threw away her old ones. It occurred to her that at last she would have enough room for all her stuff. Somehow she couldn’t feel properly sad about Matthias. Sometimes she cried and cried without stopping. At other times she completely forgot that he was gone. They were always spending a day or two apart, being alone wasn’t an effort. Gillian hadn’t even been to his funeral, how could she know he was really dead? She took off her blouse and bra. Looking down herself, it was easy to imagine nothing had happened. The accident had left her with a couple of bruises on her torso and some stitches on one leg, but other than that there were no signs on her body. Then she raised her head and looked at her face. In the hospital all she had seen were the wounds. What she saw now, over an almost intact body, took all her strength away. Her stomach knotted, and she crumpled to the floor. She crawled to the bedroom on all fours and flopped into bed. She felt her naked body, belly, waist, hips.

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