18) I had been wandering the beach for the better part of the day. Were it not for the violent asphyxiation of fish in great numbers in the littoral zone there would have had no waves at all. Had the poor moon been dismissed? But, oh, my tender feet. Rest and pause, I'm embarrassed to say, is what I needed. I've thousands of miles ahead of me, over rocky and angry land, and here I am complaining about pacing a passive beach. Well, seems I am in a bit of a bind, n'est pas? And then, just when my diminished condition was all I could manage to repulse as thought (so to entertain brighter notions), what should I see but another person. So now I had to repulse a stranger, too? It was a lot to take. I picked up a stick and charged the thing. She screamed. (If a man, he was not one then.) She ran. I wanted her only out of my sight but she went a good deal further. I took her place at the rock. It felt good, almost mythic, as though I had founded a...well, a...point of view? Some myth, you stupid freakish lout. I can be hard on myself.
I needed to piss. I was alone and then some. I drew my joint of regeneration from my pants when I noticed a magazine of Spanish porn, well creased in the sand, very near me. A sudden rock fall knocked me out, put me under.