Graham Greene: Two Gentle People

Riding the big train today and started to daydream, in the daydreamy style of reductive logic unique to the accompaniment of a train horn, the subject which was What I Might Read to the Internet Tonight. And so, in the comparatively confined space of that dreamscape, the decision of What To Read, usually answered with the same response to the question "What am I reading right now? or "Who's the First Writer That Comes to Mind... NOW?" become exponentially more imposing, as the question, in mid-daydream, instead became "What might I read tonight that will send pleasant dreams to the Entire Internet? And since when did accountability become an issue for a homespun raconteuse? And how can I live up to these sorts of pressures, and what will happen to the electromagnetic and fragile psychic balance of the universe AT LARGE if my sandmanic selection stirs even one listener to a point of restlessness, or worse, causes nightmares!" And it was just about at this point that the eyes started to roll in the head everywhich way but forward, and when the breath started to shorten, and when all signs turned to Level Four Anxiety Attack, did I snap open my eyes and discover that the big train daydream had, at some point, evolved into big train actual dream, and in doing so, I managed a tiny little daytime nightmare so that you wouldn't have to. And with that, the decision is suddenly fraught with nothing more than the act of reaching up and grabbing whatever, because despite twenty hundred email spams and the need to read my self to sleep following the time on the train, I am now compulsively focused on satisfying your need for randomness. That, Internet, is commitment.
So here you are, the result of a page opened at random from the book grabbed at random from Miette's Short Story Collection Shelf.