The Chain of Chance
While I was filling my
toilet kit, I came across something solid. The automatic. It had completely
slipped my mind. At that moment I would have liked nothing better than to ditch
it under the bathtub; instead I buried it in the larger suitcase, under my
shirts, then carefully dried off the skin around my chest and stood before the
mirror to attach the sensors. There had been a time when my body used to show
marks in these places, but they were gone now. To attach the first electrode I
located my heart's apex beat between my ribs, but the other electrode refused to
stick in the region of the clavicular fossa. I dried off the skin a second time
and fixed some tape on either side, so the sensor wouldn't stick out beyond the
collarbone. I was new at this game; I'd never had to do it on my own before.
Next: shirt, pants, and suspenders. I'd started wearing suspenders after my
return trip to earth. I was more comfortable that way, because I didn't have to
keep reaching for my pants, which always felt as if they were on the verge of
falling.
Translated by Louis Irbarne, Harcourt Brace
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