Night had come over me with such insistence that I did not realize till now that I had escaped into sleep. A startling coolness had wakened me, and with it the awareness that—impossible, so soon?—this was the time of ending, the beginning of summer’s end. Only days ago, Paul had informed me of the approaching date of his departure. “You can stay here until before winter if you want,” he told me. “This is a good place to write. In winter it’s uninhabitable—the water freezes over.” I glanced about the room I would be leaving.
The strange book was gone—and, with it, the account of the island atrocity. I got up to search for the yellow sheet, Paul’s intimate notes. It was where I had hidden it. I would keep those notes.
A soft knock at the door. I slipped on my army fatigues.
Sonya came into my room. A mixture of pleasure and apprehension alerted me that this was the first time I had seen her since the infinite distance from last night.
She sat on the bed, next to me.
“I came to say—”
“No,” I interrupted. I had to speak first. “About what happened—” I was about to say I was sorry, but that was inadequate. I shifted: “I didn’t stop what was happening because I thought Paul was playing one of his games until it turned ugly and then I did stop it—please remember that, Sonya. I stopped it when”—I couldn’t say the words when he threatened to strike you. “I was a coward, but I did stop it.”
“Shhhh,” she said. She touched my lips with one finger, holding it there, removed it. “It was all a game.”
“You’re lying.”
She jerked away from me. “We played a game, John,” she said, facing me.
“But you were crying, I felt your tears.”
“Those were your tears.” She did not look away from me.
She was lying, I knew it, I had to know it, and I had to force her away from those deadly lies: “Paul wasn’t playing when he clenched his fist to—”
She raised her voice. “Goddammit, John, Paul would never hit me!” She stood up, rigid before me.
“Sonya—”
“It was a game, goddammit—and we all played it!”
I stood before her. Only silence was possible for this infinity of moments.
Her voice relented: “I came to tell you that I’m returning to Paris with Paul.”
“You’re staying with him?”
“Of course. I love him,” she said as if that was the only answer. “I’m leaving now, the boat and the car are waiting.”
Today—leaving today?
“Paul is staying only to take care of some business with the village attorney. I’m meeting him in New York. We’re flying together.”
Her words sounded rehearsed, weary—or perhaps I only wanted to believe that and nothing more, nothing else she was saying, nothing she had said.
Her expression softened. She seemed about to touch me. She turned and moved away. She paused at the door. She faced me.
“Good-bye … my dear John.”
Would I ever, ever believe her? “Good-bye … Sonya.”
Appearing in my room abruptly as he always did, for surprise, Stanty stood at attention before me; he was wearing a vaguely military uniform. Before I could demand that he get the fuck out—
“I came to say good-bye, John Rechy,” he said, with a slight bow. “My father is driving me to school today.”
I did not move.
“Good-bye … John Rechy,” he repeated, almost in a whisper. He held out his hand to me.
I stared at him in disgusted fascination. Did he really believe that I would touch him—touch the hand that would have lunged out of the black water and pulled me down?
My hand extends.
He takes it. His hand is cold, bloodless.
I try to pull my hand away. He clasps it.
I yank away from the deadened flesh.
Paul stood with me on the lawn, awaiting word that the car that would take him to the airport had arrived. He had just completed his business in the village. I had not seen him—I had been avoiding him—since the drunken, feverish night.
“Have you considered staying longer, to write?” he asked me.
“Maybe. Briefly.”
He gave me instructions on how the house would be closed.
We walked toward the boat.
“Where will you go from here?” Paul asked me.
“A big city.” I looked across the lawn, where I had first seen the somber dark statues.
Paul took another step toward the motorboat. He turned to look at me and then walked back. “John—”
What had occurred among Sonya, him, and me, that drunken feverish night, had been left unspoken. He would speak about it now.
“John—” Again, only my name.
“Paul—”
He moved close to me, so close that I thought I could hear his heart beating—or mine. He embraced me, tightly. He kissed me on the mouth, his tongue darted about my lips to open them. My lips remained closed. When his retreated, I touched my mouth. There was no trace of blood on my finger.
“Good-bye … Paul.”
“Man? … Good-bye.”