Mattia's voice no longer stirred anything in his stomach, but he was aware of the idea of him and always would be, as the only true benchmark for everything that had come afterward.

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.

[Their love] had burned itself out, like a forgotten candle in an empty room, leaving behind a ravenous discontent.

Twin primes: pairs of prime numbers that are close to each other, almost neighbors, but between them there is always an even number that prevents them from truly touching. If you go on counting, you discover that these pairs gradually become rarer, lost in that silent, measured space made only of ciphers. You develop a distressing presentiment that the pairs encountered up until that point were accidental, that solitude is the true destiny. Then, just when you’re about to surrender, you come across another pair of twins, clutching each other tightly.

She emptied herself of Fabio and of herself, of all the useless efforts she had made to get where she was and find nothing there. With detached curiosity she observed the rebirth of her weaknesses, her obsessions. This time she would let them decide, since she hadn't been able to do anything anyway. Against certain parts of yourself you remain powerless, she said to herself, as she regressed pleasurably to the time when she was a girl.

Choices are made in brief seconds and paid for in the time that remains

Even though he was afraid to admit it, when he was with her it seemed it was worth doing all those normal things that normal people do.