Mr Salary

by Sally Rooney

It was in my nature to absorb large volumes of information during times of distress, like I could master the distress through intellectual dominance.

Sexually I’m very warm and generous, I told my friends. It’s just the other stuff where the frigidity comes through.

Death was, of course, the most ordinary thing that could happen, at some level I knew that. Still, I had stood there waiting to see the body in the river, ignoring the real living bodies all around me, as if death was more of a miracle than life was. I was a cold customer. It was too cold to think of things all the way through.

Why not? You’re in love with me, aren’t you? Infamously.