Aiming it, in a moment of terrifying déjà vu, at a prone, vulnerable Logan.
“Caleb, no. Please, please don’t. Not again.”
“He came here, Isabel. He came to me.”
Tears blur my vision.
I’m dizzy. Disoriented. Weeping, sobbing, gasping, unable to breathe.
Staggering to Caleb.
To you.
To him.
I don’t know anything.
“No, please, Caleb.” I hear my voice. “Please. I love him.”
“You lovedmefirst!” You . . . he . . . Caleb . . . shouts. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a shout from those lips.
“Did I?” I’m in front of you. Gripping your arm, clutching your bicep, pulling with all my strength, trying to pull the barrel away. “Or did I just not know any better? I never knew anything but what you allowed me to know! I never knew anything! I never knew you, there was never anything to know. You were an enigma. You’ve always been an enigma, Caleb! You are totally opaque. Nothing gets in, nothing gets out. I never know what you’re thinking, what you’re feeling. I never know what you want. You’d fuck me, but it meant nothing. You never kissed me. You never touched me as if you cared. Youpossessedme, and nothing else. Is that love?”
“Isabel—”
“NO! I heard you out, now you fucking listen to me! I don’t remember much, but I remember going to see you at the café, once. How you turned me down, and how it hurt. But I was a stupid little girl obsessed with a good-looking older man. I didn’t know what I wanted. And I don’t even remember being her, anymore, that silly infatuated little immigrant girl. The problem is, I’m not her anymore, I haven’t been for a long time. And you know what else I remember? All the times you dominated me, fucked me and fucked me and fucked me, toyed with me, played with me, got me right to the edge but wouldn’t let me come, as punishment for some sin I never committed. I remember you fucking my mouth until it hurt, until I gagged and choked and couldn’t breathe. I remember you pulling on my hair until I thought it was going to rip out by the roots. I remember you showing up in the middle of the night, fucking me, and leaving. I remember never seeing you face to face during sex. That’s what I remember! Being athingfor you! Being your slave! Nothing but a... afuck-toy! That’s what I was, that’sallI was. And then now that you start to finally show some semblance of humanity, of being a real person with real feelings, I’m supposed to go, ‘Oh yeah, I guess I did love him after all’? What was I to you, Caleb? What did I mean? Why did you keep me all those years? If you really sat at my side while I was in a coma, not for six months like you always told me, but for fouryears, thenwhy?Why? And why create this elaborate persona? Why keep it all secret? Why should I believe anything you told me? I want to, but I don’t think I can. You’ve lied about too much, lied about you, about me, about everything. I don’t think you even know the truth anymore yourself.” I step over Logan, who has regained his breath, finally, and is working on finding his feet. I put myself between the gun and Logan. “Let it be over, Caleb.”
“Itwasover, goddammit! I let you go. Andhebrought you back here. To me.”
“Put the gun down, Caleb.” I look into your eyes, Caleb, and I see a world of torment, I see hell, I see agony. Why now, Caleb? Why now?
Logan, You are behind me. Chest heaving. I can feel You, feel Your heat, feel Your chest against my spine as You breathe.
I am looking at you, though, Caleb. You stare me down. Stareintome. The pistol is held casually in your hand; you spin it and grip it by the barrel. Hand it to me.
Back up a step. A second. Your gaze never leaves mine, Caleb.
“You’ll never know, Isabel.”
“What won’t I know?” I whisper the question.
“What you meant to me. I told you that, once. I told you that I’m not the kind of man who can... express such things.” You swallow hard, Caleb. “I wish I were. I wish there were some way for me to make right all the ways I fucked up with you, for so many years.”
“Caleb—”
Into the rear passenger-side seat, through the still-ajar door. A last glance at me. At my belly. Brownbrown eyes, normally so flat and cold and expressionless, blink. Hard. As if seeing the child within my womb, as if seeing in a single glance all that could have been.
And then you close the door, and Thomas puts the SUV into gear. Accelerates smoothly toward the exit.
I do not know why I follow. Why I jog through the cloud of exhaust, pistol still held in my hand, a heavy weight, heavy with the knowledge of Len’s life cut short. Why I run out after you, Caleb, into the street. Cars honk, tires squeal. A voice shouts.
I feel You behind me, taking the weapon away, wrapping Your arms around me. Pulling me away.
I watch as you drive away, and I know it is the End. I know. I know.
Good-bye, Caleb.
A stoplight. A one-way street, three lanes abreast. In the right lane, a delivery van, white, featureless, old. In the left lane, a long black SUV. In the middle, an empty space. The Range Rover glides to a halt between the two vehicles. Idling at the light, waiting for the green.
