I look at the list of names on the blackboard and the persons engaged in playing. Some are absorbed in the gambling, their faces turned towards the table. Others stand there only for the sake of appearances: no movement escapes them; they see everyone who goes in or out. Others use billiards to attract attention, not usually from their partners in the game but from some woman in the room or at the bar. It's a good thing to wear a sports singlet, so that you can take off your shirt, either because you're too hot or because you want to show off the muscles of your arms, forearms and shoulders. But in order to display your muscles here, it is best first to develop them systematically with weights and dumbbells, as much for aesthetic needs as for the imperative needs of urban self-defence, mainly but not entirely nocturnal. I marvel at the women with their compact, smooth bicepts. I see them moving round the billiard-tables, unhurried, letting their black or golden skin gleam under the light. At a given moment they seem to have haloes and my ears ring. I'm drinking neat tequila with salt and lemon, and as it inigorates me I feel impatient because I'm not geetting up to have a closer look at them. Instead, I speak to Manastabal, my guide, and ask her if the laundromat is the first circle of Hell. She says:
(I don't know, Wittig, whether the circles of Hell have been enumerated. But never mind that, I've no intention of making you visit them in order.)
It takes all my energy to reply:
(Let's go there in disorder, then.)
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