That night I went to bed early.
The only light came from the bathroom down the hall, and the dim room was a chalky gray like moonlight defused through thick clouds. I lay on my bed staring up at the gray, thinking about all that had happened. Concluding a murder investigation-no matter how seemingly successful-is always incomplete and bittersweet, and, as usual, I was depressed. I had found the murderer, solved the mystery, but that did nothing for Nicole. It couldn’t bring her back, couldn’t undo what had been done to her, couldn’t wake her from the nightmare she had lived through, had died in. It couldn’t absolve me from failing her in the first place, from failing Dexter. Only God could do that, and, as I lay there looking up at nothing, I prayed for forgiveness.
Later, when I answered the phone, my mouth was dry, my voice sleepy, though I was still wide awake.
“Hey.”
It was Susan.
“Hey,” I said.
“How’d it go?” she asked.
I told her. And as I did, the three hundred miles between us shrank to nothing, our connection seeming to bypass circuits and lines and everything mechanical to become direct and intense and intimate.
“My God,” she said.
“That’ll teach you to ask.”
“No,” she said. “I’m glad you told me. I want you to tell me everything.” She was silent a beat before asking, “Do you think he’ll confess?”
“Already has,” I said. “Went with me right then and did it.”
“How do you feel about the inmate-what was his name?”
“Dexter,” I said. “Guilty.”
“I figured you did,” she said.
“If I hadn’t staged the whole memorial service in the first place,” I said, “or confronted him in such an uncontrolled environment or dove for the gun…”
“Have you talked to anyone?”
“You mean besides you?”
“Yeah.”
“No,” I said. “Not about how I feel.”
“Oh,” she said, a little startled. “Thank you.”
I didn’t say anything.
“Sounds like you need to get away for a while,” she said. “That’s the reason I was calling-to invite you up for the weekend. I’d really love to see you and-”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I just can’t. I-”
“I told myself I wasn’t going to do this. I let you know how I felt, and I was going to just wait on your response, not push it. I’m sorry.”
“No,” I said. “That’s not it at all. I’d love for us to get together. Really. I’m just not ready to come back to Atlanta yet. It’s too soon, wounds too fresh. Could we go somewhere else?”
“Yeah, sure,” she said.
“What about that bed and breakfast we stayed at near Charleston?” I asked.
“Oh, John,” she exclaimed. “That sounds wonderful.”
After we made the plans, she said, “I feel so hopeful about us,” she said. “But I want you to know that even if we don’t wind up together, I’m glad we’re doing this… getting to know the real us.”
“Me too.”
We were quiet for a while and I could hear her breathing. It reminded me of making love in sweet silence, caught up in passion beyond words, and it made me want her even more.
“I don’t need you, John,” she said.
“What?”
“I don’t need you,” she said. “For over a year now, it’s been just me. And I’m comfortable with that. I’m learning who I really am and I like me very much. I don’t have to have someone in my life-that’s why I haven’t been looking. I’m not looking for someone to rescue or complete me.”
“Good,” I said. “That’s really good.”
“I’m not finished,” she said. “I don’t need you… but I do want you. I want you very badly. I want you in my life, in my body, in my soul.”
Images of being in all three filled my mind, and I lost myself in the sound of her breathing.
“I don’t want to hang up,” she said after a long, comfortable silence.
Lying in the dark, listening to her words, her silences, reminded me of when we were first dating, the hours we spent tethered together by phone cords, unseen radios playing the same songs in the background, the darkness keeping the rest of the world at bay. Like everything about her, this felt familiar, comfortable, like a home I had only briefly known.
“So, don’t,” I said.
“I don’t really have anything else to say,” she said.
“Just breathe,” I said.
“What?”
“I like listening to you breathe,” I said.
“But I’m about to fall asleep,” she said.
“That’s okay,” I said. “I like listening to you sleep.”