She found out about his accident through the Internet. A circulated e-mail sent to everyone at school, a six-storey fall around 11 o’clock last night. They wanted everyone to know it was an accident, the word was mentioned at least thrice. She had her reservations. Though she had never spoken a word to him, she knew him better than his friends at school. Together they would stay up until sunrise exchanging mobile phone messages and chatting online. His cat’s name was Kafka, his favorite pasta was tuna and olive oil, his shoe size was 9 1/2. She knew he was good on his feet.
After receiving the e-mail she left her house without turning off her computer. She chose a direction and headed toward it, watching her feet move on the pavement. She forgot to wear shoes. She watched the sidewalk turn to dirt and then to grass. At this distance the glint of cars on the highway moved slowly, like shiny insects on a tabletop. The little people in their little cars, speeding always forward. From far away she could see all of them, standing in the middle like the fulcrum between them and their destinations. There she stopped, facing west toward the highway and the late afternoon sun. She watched the cars in the distance and knew none of them could ever feel what she felt. Stuck, immobile, like the mosquito in amber in Jurrasic Park. Nobody else could ever feel what she felt, and the only one who did died on the sidewalk outside his apartment building last night. And now there she stood, unmoving, as clouds whipped across the afternoon sky and a drop of hot blood trickled down her nose.
Light haired, light skinned girl outdoors, late afternoon/angular sunlight, trees and greenery in the distance, bloody nose.
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