“There’s something… there’s something I need to ask you, something important.”
Peter’s voice is tinged with hopefulness. He says that he understands, that he wants to talk, too, that that’s why he suggested we meet. He can meet pretty much any time. I can choose—whenever it suits me best. He can make some food at home or we can meet somewhere in the city if I’d prefer. At home. Those words stand out from the others, loom up and come toward me. To be able to go home again. But no, I know that won’t do. It’s much too soon for that.
“I don’t mean like that,” I mumble. “I can’t see you, not yet. I’m in the middle of… in the middle of something.”
He clears his throat. I mean, I had already explained in my email that I had something I needed to finish before we saw each other. He says that must mean I’m writing. But he knows I don’t want to talk about my current projects until they’re done, so he won’t ask.
Then he goes quiet and waits. My fingers squeeze the phone.
“You wrote that something had happened. And then you told me about the little girl you saw at the park.”
Peter hems and haws on the other end. It sounds as if the memory makes him smile.
“Exactly.”
“When you wrote that something had happened, was that what you were referring to? That you saw a child at the park, a girl on a swing who looked like me? Is that why you got in touch?”
Was that the only reason? I want to add, but I refrain.
Peter takes a while to answer. I hear a scraping sound as if he’s pulling out a chair and sitting down. My legs shaking, I walk into the kitchen and follow suit, sitting down in the same seat where I’ve spent so much time in recent days and weeks.
“So much has happened, Elena. Enough that I think we should talk face-to-face. We really need to…”
His words fade away.
My eyes go out the window and straight across the yard. The kitchen light is off over there. There’s no sign of the Storms.
“It’s so great to hear your voice. I’ve… I’ve been missing you. Really missing you.”
Peter’s voice is closer now, as if he’s pressing the phone right to his face. I close my eyes and think yet again about how he used to wrap me in his arms when I was tired or down, how there was a perfect spot for my cheek in the space just above his collarbone. When I had his arms around me, it felt like nothing bad could reach me. I open my eyes again.
“And her?” I say. “How are things with her?”
This time the silence lasts for a long time. Peter hesitates.
“I… Not so well.”
A shock runs through my body.
“What do you mean?”
I hear him fumbling for words on the other end of the phone, hear him hesitate and start again.
“I understand that you’re curious, Elena, but it’s hard to talk about this on the phone. I’d rather that we meet, give ourselves time to have a conversation like that.”
My fingers gripping the phone are suddenly slippery from sweat. I move the phone to my other hand, try to get my pulse to calm down. My throat feels tight, and I have to force the words out.
“You need to tell me what happened. You need to.”
Maybe something in my tone makes it through to him and convinces him.
“OK,” he says. “Then I’ll just say it.”
He sighs into the phone. I remember how his breaths used to feel against my skin, remember the heat and the closeness.
“She died, Elena. She’s dead. That’s what happened.”
Something cold runs through my body and my hand flies up to my mouth. Peter keeps talking, says something that I don’t catch. The room is spinning. I can’t get a word out. In a parallel world, I ask questions and listen while he tells me how and when and what happened. In a parallel world I come off as interested, considerate, appalled.
She’s dead. That’s what happened.
I try pulling my sweater tighter around me, but that doesn’t help. The cold is coming from within. Short, intermittent thoughts come to me, completely without context. Then I register Peter’s voice again. To begin with, it comes from far away. Then I hear it more and more clearly.
“It was an accident, a sheer accident, and I want you to know that I don’t…”
My body reacts on its own, so fast that I hardly understand what’s happening. It’s not until I’ve already hung up on Peter and thrown the phone away from me that I understand. Shivers slowly make their way through each layer of my body until they’ve taken over completely and my teeth start chattering. Why did I call? Why, why, why? I should have realized that it would be like this. On the other side of the questions is neither calmness nor clarity. On the other side, there is only more darkness.
My body starts shaking. I think about what could have been and what will never be, of what I believed and hoped. None of it matters now. I feel that so clearly, that it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters. Then my consciousness trails away and my thoughts decrease. I get up and lower the blinds, close the window to the outside world. With my computer under my arm, I leave the kitchen.
I’m going to sit down and write, and this time I’m not going to stop until I’m done. I’m going to write the rest of the story, all the way to the final sentence. And then… then I’ll…
I shuffle out to the front hall and then up the stairs.
One step at a time.
36
She had her chance. In the end, she actually got it. It was as if fate reached out a helping hand. Fate or significantly darker forces. The kind that were brought to life by her fantasies, put in motion during all the hours and days she had dedicated to digging down deep into the dark decay of humanity.
Hatred and desire for revenge. Primitive energies.
The current situation, whatever the cause, had now finally been revealed.
The opportunity.
He was between her and the abyss. Vulnerable, exposed. Everything happened so fast, and yet she experienced it as if time were being stretched, as if every second were being drawn out to its limit.
But then when she saw him so close to the edge, so close to eternity, something totally different from what she’d been counting on ended up happening. Completely different emotions poured in and filled her. It was like she was looking at herself from above, at a distance. Or maybe, she thought later, she was seeing herself through someone else’s eyes.
It only lasted a second, but it was enough.
This isn’t what you want, this isn’t who you are.
37
The doorbell breaks the silence. My hands stop moving. I look up and listen. Someone has come to see me. I know who it is, suspect what it’s about. The clock chimes again, and I cast a quick glance at the open bedroom door. From where I sit, I can just see the first steps leading down to the front door. I see myself moving the computer aside, getting out of the bed, walking down the stairs, and opening the door. I see it happen, imagine how it will be, but I don’t budge. The doorbell goes quiet, and I turn my full attention back to the keyboard.
The hours pass, and I lose track of time. My back and neck start to ache. My wrists hurt, but I don’t stop writing. It grows dark in the room, and then it grows light again. I’m still writing. Did I sleep a little? An hour here and there, at most two or three in a row, maybe. But it’s as if I don’t need sleep anymore, as if I have wrestled with insomnia for so long that, somehow, I’ve overcome it, liberating myself from one of the most fundamental human needs. As long as I can write, I don’t need to sleep. I leave the bedroom only to go to the bathroom or when my stomach screams for something to eat. Apparently some needs are still intact.