She found herself thinking of how it would feel to be safely trapped in his arms, with no more possibility to choose.

Mattia was right: the days had slipped over her skin like a solvent, one after the other, each removing a very thin layer of pigment from her tattoo, and from both of their memories. The outlines, like the circumstances, were still there, black and well delineated, but the colors had merged together until they faded into a dull, uniform tonality, a neutral absence of meaning.

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.

She hadn't chosen him over all the others. The truth was that she hadn't even thought about anyone else.

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

...finally her hands, so light, holding his head still and catching all his thoughts and imprisoning them there, in the space that no longer existed between them.

In fact, they didn't talk much at all, but they spent time together, each in his own abyss, held safe and tight by the other's silence.