The Song of Achilles

by Madeline Miller

He pressed against me, crushing my lips to wine.

Had she really thought I would not know him? I could recognize him by touch alone, by smell, I would know him blind, by the way his breaths came and his feet struck the earth. I would know him in death, at the end of the world.

There was nothing clever to say, so I said something foolish.

Overhead, the stars were veiled. I could feel the air’s heaviness. There would be a storm tonight. The rain would be soaking, filling up the earth till she burst her seams. It would gush down from the mountain tops, gathering strength to sweep away what stood in its path: animals and houses and men. He is such a flood, I thought.