Really, she had been living with two men all along, John and Benjamin. The thing was that she had never admitted it to herself.
She would wake up some mornings with a stranger beside her. She always knew at once when John was manifesting. He looked different; he had a different face. But he manifested seldom, and she had learned to anticipate his appearances. Even so, inevitably, there were times when she would wake up and find John in bed with her; and then she would feel frightened and confused. It was nothing she could ever explain to anyone. It was not a topic that came up on Donahue—“What to do when your lover is actually two people!” There was no one she had even tried to explain it to—except Susan, who was a special case. But Susan, when you came right down to it, was a pampered California preppie who could not help condescending even when she tried to be Amelie’s friend. Amelie forgave this … it was predictable … but she despaired of any real contact. Besides, Susan was obviously messed up over John.
So I’m alone.
Amelie awoke with this bleak thought echoing in her head. She turned and regarded the face of the man beside her. It was Benjamin. Absolutely no question. But the uneasiness lingered. She stood up, pulled her nightgown on, walked back down the silent corridor to the room Dr. Kyriakides had assigned to her.
There was a little Sanyo stereo they’d bought to replace the one Roch had trashed. Amelie slid a Doors tape into the player and plugged the headphones into the jack. The tape was L.A. Woman. She boosted the volume and flopped down onto the bed.
Thinking of Benjamin. Thinking of last summer, when they’d been together—before Roch, before Susan. Hot days in that crummy little apartment. Hot nights.
Thinking of wrapping her legs around him. Of his weight against her … of his gentleness, even when he was close to coming. Of the way he laid his hand alongside her cheek, intimate as a kiss.
Thinking of his eyes.
Wondering where she would go … because it was over, wasn’t it? No way to crank back the seasons. No way to make it be new again.
Morrison performed his familiar death wail. The sound seemed to come from inside her head. She reached over to slide the volume up but her hand slipped and she hit the reject button instead. The tape popped out. The silence was eerie and sudden.
She went to the window and stood gazing out, without music or thoughts … as empty as she could make herself, watching the snow fall.
Dr. Kyriakides: Do you remember your childhood?
Benjamin: Yes.
Kyriakides: But it wasn’t your childhood.
Benjamin: It was a shadow. I remember faces. I remember moments. Is it so different for everyone else?
Kyriakides: You were another person then.
Benjamin: No. That doesn’t make sense. I can’t say, ‘I was John.’ I was there all along … with him. In the shadows.
Kyriakides: And then you came into the light.
Benjamin: Yes.
Kyriakides: When he created you.
Benjamin: If you say so.
Kyriakides: You were always yourself—is that how it seems?
Benjamin: I was always myself. I came into the light, I lived at home. I went to school. Then I was back in the dark awhile. And then I woke up and I was on the island, John’s island. I knew what he’d been doing and why he was there.
Kyriakides: And why you were there?
Benjamin: I knew that, too. [Pause.] You have to understand, it was the end of his road. He’d gone as far as he could. [Pause.] He wanted to die, but he didn’t want to kill himself.
Kyriakides: I can’t imagine John saying that.
Benjamin: Oh, he would never say it. Especially not to you. He doesn’t trust you. He’s never forgiven you.
Kyriakides: For making him what he is?
Benjamin: For leaving him alone.
Kyriakides: But surely—it’s possible now that he is dying. And yet he fights it.
Benjamin: The funny thing is that he’s changed his mind. He thinks maybe there is a reason to go on living.
Kyriakides: Can you tell me that reason?
Benjamin: No.
Kyriakides: He doesn’t want you to.
Benjamin: Right.
Kyriakides: You know that about him?
Benjamin: I know a lot of things about him.
Kyriakides: Have you always known these things?
Benjamin: Known them, maybe. Never thought about them much. Never used to do this much thinking!
Kyriakides: Is that because of the way you’re changing?
Benjamin: Could be. [Another pause.] He’s all through me now, you know. We’re sort of mixed together. There used to be a kind of wall. But that’s breaking down.
Kyriakides: Well, I think that’s good, Benjamin. I think that needs to happen.
Benjamin: Well, it isn’t easy for him. He’s fighting it.
Kyriakides: That’s unfortunate. Why is he fighting it?
Benjamin: The same reason he wanted to die, back on the island. Because he hates me. Didn’t you know that? He hates all of us. [A longer pause.] Almost all.
Benjamin came into the room while Amelie was packing.
Amelie ignored him—just went on emptying the big chest of drawers into her ragged Salvation Army suitcase, pretending he wasn’t there.
After a time, watching her, he said, “Where will you go?”
It was a very Benjamin thing to say. Straight to the point, no bullshit, kind of little-boy innocent. It reminded her of what she had loved about him and what she still loved, and that was painful; she winced. She looked up at him. “I don’t know. Maybe back to Montreal. It doesn’t matter.”
He said, “I wish you wouldn’t go.”
She turned to the window. The snow was still falling. Fucking horrible winter. That was the thing about winter in this city. It was likely to do any fucking thing. If you were ready for snow you got rain; if you were ready for rain you got ice. “I thought you understood.”
“You’re leaving me.”
She turned to him. “So? You left me.”
“No. John left you.”
“But you were talking about leaving. Even before that. And when you finally called, you called Susan.”
He shrugged, as if to say: Yes, that’s so.
She said, “Things had already started to change, hadn’t they? Even then. You knew we couldn’t stay together. You knew what was happening.” He did not answer, which was answer enough. Amelie nodded. “Yeah—you knew.”
“I know a lot of things I don’t want to know. A lot of it is John. There’s more John now than there used to be.” His frown was huge. “I wish you would stay a while longer.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s cold out. Because you don’t have anywhere to go.” That helpless look. “Because there’s nothing anyone can do about this, about what’s happening to me.”