My flat.
In bed.
You have an optimistic and trusting nose, Priya says.
How can you tell? I ask. What have noses got to do with anything?
You can see everything in the nose, Priya says. And the chin. And in the shape of the eyes. And you have such kind fingers, though your thumb looks rather stubborn.
Is this how lovers talk? I ask.
I really wouldn’t recall, Priya says.
What about with Alan? I ask.
That was years ago, Priya says. I’m not sure I want to remember.
Was there a honeymoon period? I ask.
There’s always a honeymoon period, Priya says. Then there was a humdrum period. Then there was a blue period – a fifteen-years-together-and-what-for? period.
And what period are you in now? I ask.
The illicit period, Priya says.
You’re what they would call an attractive couple, I say.
Oh I’m sure we are, Priya says. But I really don’t want to think about it.
You must be comfortably off, I say. Your joint salary …
We’re the bourgeois you no doubt despise, philosopher, Priya says. Upon whom you’re getting your revenge right now.
Is this what this is about?
This is your banal affair. Your normcore affair. Before you meet some hot and fabulous European. Some Italian, or whatever. Some fellow philosopher. Some continentalist. Who’d actually understand you and your terribly complex thoughts.
Priya, flicking through a notebook.
What’s your theory of the everything, philosopher? Priya asks. Do you have one? What’s the use of philosophy if it doesn’t give you a theory of the universe? Fuck. Okay, a more friendly question: what do you actually write about?
The tohu vavohu, I say.
The tohu … what? Priya asks.
It’s from the Bible, I say. Chaos is the best word for it. Or evil. In the beginning God created the heavens and earth. And the earth was without form and void. That’s how the tohu vavohu is translated in the Bible: without form and void.
So God made chaos? Priya asks.
There’s a whole rabbinical tradition that argues that God made the world from chaos – by shaping the tohu vavohu, I say.
Who cares? Priya says. Sell it to me, philosophy-boy.
It means God didn’t create the universe from nothing, I say.
So? Priya says.
And that God isn’t omnipotent, either, I say. Because the tohu vavohu couldn’t be definitely ordered. Chaos always threatens to break back in. That’s what happens with Noah’s flood and Jeremiah’s prophecies …
Didn’t God, like, send Noah’s flood to punish him? Priya asks?
Sure, he unleashed the chaos, I say. He unlocked the doors and portals, and let it flood in.
So God was still in charge, Priya says. It was just a matter of creative destruction, or whatever
But maybe God isn’t always in charge, I say. The order of the world – God’s order in the Bible – can’t hold back chaos.
Back to your apocalypse, right? Back for your desire for it all to end. Self-loathing, basically.
World-loathing. This world-loathing.
How did you get like this? Priya asks. How did you get so extreme?
You said you’re a madwoman. You said you were dead. That’s pretty extreme …
Yes … dead …
Does Alan know you’re dead?
I’ve tried to tell him. I’ve – tried – to – tell – him. But he didn’t understand. Do you understand?
Maybe I do.
God, what does all this add up to? Priya asks. Our afternoon together. The beginning of our affair. What does it mean?
Why does it have to mean anything? I ask.
You’re the philosopher – you tell me, Priya says. I mean, what did we just do? What are we doing? In the middle of the day. In the middle of the universe … Look at us, lying around. In disarray. Are we allowed to be like this? Are we allowed to do this?
We can do what we like, I say.
But should we be allowed to do what we like?: that’s my question, Priya says.
Who’s stopping us? I ask.
The light on the floor, Priya says. That beams through the skylight … The parallelogram of light. What is it?
Light, just light, I say.
I think it’s God, Priya says.
God? I say.
I think it’s all we know of God, Priya says. A quality of light. A patch of light. Is God watching us?
No one’s watching, I say. Unless Alan’s on the roof.
God’s watching, Priya says. That’s the thing … I like using the word, God, philosopher. I feel like I’m allowed to use the word, God, here.
Me, quoting: Is God unknown? Is he manifest as the sky? This, rather, I believe.
Don’t say you’re an atheist – I’m bored of atheists, Priya says. Atheism is so dull a position, especially if you are an atheist. You should always be interesting about God.
Do you believe in God? I ask.
I think God believes in me, Priya says. I think I’m a dream in the mind of God.
So God’s dreaming all this, I say. God’s dreaming you and dreaming me.
Maybe – why not? I say.
Why not … why not anything? Priya says. God, I feel afternoon-drunk. Drunk on the afternoon. I feel like I’m falling, just falling. And you, too – you’re falling, too. Because we’re both unanchored. We’ve got no … responsibilities. There’s nothing for us to do, except … this. Whatever this is.
It’s like something’s taking place … through us, Priya says. Despite us, almost. Against us, maybe. Some kind of event – or non-event. Something that’s not happening. That’s subtracting happening from happening. What the fuck am I saying? What is this room doing to me?
I feel so vague, Priya says. Do you feel vague? Are we supposed to feel like this? Like, we can’t think anything. Anything clear, anyway. Anything precise … We’ve been disarmed. We’ve been placed out of service. We’re not needed anywhere. We’re surplus to requirements. We were ordered by mistake, or whatever, and just stockpiled …
I’m falling, philosopher, Priya says. Not falling in love, just falling. When I close my eyes, I get vertigo … Why do I come out here? Why do I feel these things? Does this flat do this to everyone? … It’s like you’ve cast some spell over me. Like you want to keep me here forever.
If I fell asleep now, what would happen? Priya asks. If I feel asleep and woke up and fell asleep and just …
So fall asleep, I say.
I have to get home … Alan will … will …, Priya says. I can’t even finish a sentence. It’s being drunk without being drunk. Fuck, I can’t think a single clear thing … I feel so fucked. God, how will I ever get up? How will I ever do anything again?
I kinda want to get dressed and go, Priya says. I kinda want to drive off home. I kinda want to actually go to the gym instead of pretending at the gym … Anything except this. But then I like this …
And you’re not going to save me – I know that, Priya says. You’re not going to break my fall. You’re not going to do anything.
You don’t need saving, I say.
What do I need? Priya asks. What do I want? What am I doing here? What’s anything? Why anything? I don’t know what I used to know. And what I know now … isn’t good for anything. And I’m not good for anything. And nor are you, but you know that.
We’re falling into the question.
Is this what it is like? Is this what philosophy’s like?
Work in Progress 