Now Monika was alone again. She stretched out in bed and listened to the wind blowing through the night outside. Like a drunk man on the run. No, that wasn’t right. Basically, the wind could not be compared to anything. Especially not when you were at its mercy, somewhere between heaven and earth in a slightly rocking car containing four overpriced apartments. And one of these apartments contained her, Monika. She lay in bed, in a pitch-dark room.
Down in the Wheel Bar the lights had definitely gone out a long time ago. She imagined what it would be like to break in there at this hour. What would she find? An abandoned restaurant with tables, on which the chairs practiced headstands. And in a closet the lifeless uniforms of the waitresses. The little nametags. Tina.
Monika forcibly dragged her thoughts away from the name; it was difficult, like a pack of dogs attached to a single leash. But she managed it. She strapped a rocket to her back and flew over the city. The black night sky made her invisible. Down below passed the many thousand buildings that made up the city. And all of them were filled to bursting with people. No space was wasted.
The wheel continued to stand still, and Monika wrapped herself tighter in her blanket. At that moment, strangers were riding the express elevators to their apartments.
Monika rolled onto her side and stared into the darkness. I won’t close my eyes, she thought, until we start turning again. But she knew that the gears of the Ferris wheel always got going again with extreme restraint and gentleness, so that you scarcely noticed it. There was nothing wrong with that in itself. The only problem was that no one deserved to be treated so tenderly. No one. At least not tonight, thought Monika. At least not by a gigantic inanimate metal structure on the outskirts of a medium-sized industrial city.