“Oh,” Jatupon sighed, “I do like you in ways.”
“What a charming endorsement! I elicit the same response everywhere I go. Oh well...truth doesn’t have to be a comfortable realm. It rarely is.”
“Yes,” said Jatupon pensively, “I imagine it rarely is.”
“The pain is so overwhelming you can’t work?”
“The boredom is so overwhelming I can’t work. It is a rot-a rot under my hairnet. I can’t do it-reflexes every day and not with—”
The mosquito waited to hear the word “him.” “Go ahead and say it” was in the mosquito’s thoughts but it was Jatupon who articulated this oblique command, “Go ahead and say it!” to twist the direction of the conversation .
“I don’t understand,” said the mosquito.
“Aren’t you wanting to give me your lecture that I have to survive?”
“I wasn’t going to say anything but you are meant for more than this dizzying work and the instinct to survive is thrust on all living things in all actions. You can’t but help obey it to some degree.”
“I can’t do it any longer.”