Scan

from Scan, by Helen Simpson, (Granta mag. no:98)

(the character is stuck in a train tunnel, on her way to doing a brain scan) perhaps this was what it was like, being born, the claustrophobic tunnel; ... what about before you were born, though? before you were conceived? Well, you can't remember it so it can't have been too bad, she told herself; presumably it will be the same after you've died. The trouble with this idea, was, before you've been born you've not been you; but once you've been alive you definitely have been you; and the idea of the extinction of the you that has definitely existed is quite different from the idea of your non-existence before you did exist.

(getting ready for the brain scan) Once naked she realized she was still wearing her watch, and unstrapped it. She was outside time now, along with the sick and the dead.

(of the scan) Never mind seeing her with no clothes on; she was about to be seen with no flesh on. The medical gaze was nothing if not penetrating.

Time was just another name for death, she got the point.