Five Quarters of the Orange / Пять четвертинок апельсина

Of course I didn’t know all that then. I learned most of this from the album, from her scribbled notes, some frantic, almost despairing – at three in the morning, anything seems possible – others almost clinical in their detachment, noting symptoms with cool scientific curiosity. Like the clock, I am divided.

Reine and Cassis were still asleep when I left, and I guessed I had about half an hour to take care of my business before they awoke. I checked the sky, which was clear and greenish, with a faint yellow stripe on the horizon. Dawn was maybe ten minutes away. I would have to hurry.

I took a bucket from the kitchen, pulled on my clogs, which were waiting on the doormat, and ran as fast as I could toward the river. I took the shortcut through Hourias’s back field, where summer sunflowers raised hairy, still-green heads at the pale sky. I kept low, invisible beneath the spread of leaves, my bucket clanging against my leg at every step. It took me less than five minutes to arrive at the Standing Stones.