27
The door is closed and Mishima is standing at the window of the parental bedroom. Holding the curtain back with one hand, he is watching the sun drowning in its own blood and his life's philosophy falling away in large sections on the balconies of the towers. The future, in freefall, is mortally wounded and, down below, men and their dreams lie shattered.
Monsieur Tuvache, a shopkeeper who has become yellow and melancholic, with the colours of the sunset reflected in his eyes, feels desolate, decrepit, dusty, dirty, abject, slimy, cracked.
He is even growing disenchanted with Lucrèce. Everything is falling apart at the seams, even love and beauty, ready for oblivion to cast them into eternity. He would like to get drunk, but alcohol is expensive, and as for the carnal act, that's yet another thing that is too tiring to contemplate. People say it is entertaining but it's merely a strange sort of gymnastics. And his thoughts go round in his mind to the sound of the hullabaloo.
There are no longer any seasons, no more rainbows, and the snow has given up. Behind the towers of the City of Forgotten Religions - which is a state of mind - are the first large sand dunes, grains from which sometimes blow onto Boulevard Bérégovoy and even under the door of the Suicide Shop. On the ground, whirling, fantastical searchlights sweep through the pollution and the overcast sky with long cones of green light. Birds that venture here on a sudden whim are asphyxiated or die of heart attacks above the towers. In the morning, women collect their feathers and use them to make themselves exotic hats before they too cast themselves into the void.
It is the time of day when shouts come from the immense stadium, suddenly illuminated, and from the population that loves the deadening whip. It is the time of day when, elsewhere, swarms of bad dreams make the first people to fall asleep twist and turn on their pillows. Alas, everything is ruined - action, desire, dreams - and as Mishima holds back the curtain, feeling the air blow in under the window, all the hairs on his arm stand on end with fear. The bedroom door opens and Lucrèce asks: 'Are you coming down to dinner, Mishima?'
'No, I'm not hungry.'
Being alive takes so long. Giving up everything takes so long.
'I'm going to bed.'
The thing is, tomorrow he'll have to live again.