Mattia thought that he and Alice were like that, twin primes, alone and lost, close but not close enough to really touch each other.

It was strange to find them here, still alive, with their shared bits of past that suddenly counted for nothing.

With a little effort, she could get up by herself

They lived the slow and invisible interpenetration of their universes, like two stars gravitating around a common axis, in ever tighter orbits, whose clear destiny is to coalesce at some point in space and time.

Do you really like studying?" Mattia nodded. "Why?" "It's the only thing I know how to do," he said shortly. He wanted to tell her that he liked studying because you can do it alone, because all the things you study are already dead, cold, and chewed over. He wanted to tell her that the pages of the schoolbooks were all the same temperature, that they left you time to choose, that they never hurt you and you couldn't hurt them either. But he said nothing.

People took what they wanted, they clutched at coincidences, the few there were, and made a life from them. . . . Choices are made in brief seconds and paid for in the time that remains.

The scene was set. All that was required was an action, a cold start, instant and brutal as beginnings always are.