- [last lines]
- Susan: It's dark now. But they feel each others' breath. And they know all they need to know. They kiss. And they feel each others' tears on their cheeks. And if there had been anybody left to see them, then they would look like normal lovers, caressing each others' faces, bodies close together, eyes closed, oblivious to the world around them. Because that is how life goes on. Like that.
- [first lines]
- Susan: [narrating] There was darkness. There is light. There are men and women. There's food. There are restaurants. Disease. There's work. Traffic. The days as we know them, the world as we imagine the world.
- Susan: Aren't you going to ask why I haven't been to work?
- Stephen Montgomery: Well you've been sick.
- Susan: Not sick, just unhappy.
- Stephen Montgomery: It's the same thing.
- Susan: Unhappy, on account of a man.
- Susan: [narrating] First, the terror. And then a moment of hunger. This is how the sense of taste disappears from our world. They don't even have time to give the disease a name.