A Clean, Well-Lighted Place Mortality Quotes

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Quote #4

What did he fear? It was not fear or dread. It was a nothing that he knew too well. It was all a nothing and a man was nothing too. It was only that and light was all it needed and a certain cleanness and order. Some lived in it and never felt it but he knew it was already nada y pues nada y pues nada. (14)

The older waiter comes face to face with some kind of concept of mortality here, realizing that the line between life and not-life is a fine one – all there is, as he sees it, is "nada y pues nada y pues nada" (nothing and then nothing and then nothing).