The Hunter's Prayer

‘Sorry.’


‘I don’t want an apology. I just wanna know what’s up. You’re not upset with me?’ She looked him in the eye, trying to remind herself who this was. She still loved him, but it was as if he were visiting her in a maximum-security prison, a layer of impenetrable glass between them, with no way to convey to him how it felt to be on her side.

‘I can’t think straight. It’s like you’re touching me and I can’t feel anything, nothing, just . . . I just need more time.’

He looked hesitant, careful. ‘Your aunt said you were on medication. You think maybe you should get them to up the dose?’ She looked at him in disbelief.

‘You want me loved up so we can fuck?’

‘That isn’t what I meant.’

‘Chris, I’m flushing the pills.’

It was his turn to look shocked.

‘I thought the doctor said you were depressed.’

‘Of course I’m depressed. Someone killed my family. I’m depressed and I’m angry and I’m full of hate—that’s how I should feel.’

‘Why? What are you gonna gain from bringing yourself down?’

She saw no point in explaining. Everyone wanted her to be happy; that was the lie of their age, that being happy was the goal. Take the pills, be happy, forget that the sky had been torn from the world this summer. But she was a country at war, its territory invaded, citizens slaughtered, fighting for its survival. How could she explain that to Chris?

Finally she put her hand on his and said, ‘I just need you to wait for me. A few more weeks, that’s all.’

He shook his head.

‘No.’ Her confusion obviously showed because he said, ‘You need me right now, whether you know it or not, and if you can’t accept that on trust, I can’t see what difference a few weeks will make.’

She knew what he wanted: to have her back the way she’d been. He wanted her to take the pills and get better, to wind the clock back to that moment in Montecatini before Lucas had crossed the street and killed two men for her. And like a dull distant bell sounding, she sensed what she’d feared from the beginning: that it was over between them.

She desperately wanted Chris to accept her for who she was now but she feared he’d always be waiting on her recovery. And he’d never understand that she wasn’t damaged but in fact more complete, possessed of the truth of how the world really was.

‘If the police find someone . . .’

‘What if they don’t?’

‘I don’t know.’ He stood up. He was leaving already and a part of her was relieved, but even so, she couldn’t believe that he was giving up so quickly. ‘Why did you come here?’

It was the wrong question and not what she’d meant to say, but he said, ‘Because I missed you, and because I thought you might need me.’ She felt bad and was willing herself to stand up, to hold him, but he looked hurt, rejected.

‘I’ll start taking the pills.’ She didn’t mean it, but she wanted to offer him something. ‘And we’ll go somewhere like you said, in September.’

‘Do you want me to stay now?’ It wasn’t an offer, more a demand for clarification, her hesitation all the response he needed. ‘I’ll be at home all summer.’ He left.

She was exhausted. She didn’t know how to speak to anyone anymore. Maybe she’d write to him and when they got back to college things would be different.

She heard voices below, doors, the faint sound of a car starting and pulling away from the front of the house. Equally distant in her own head, a voice registered the effort he’d gone to, driving all the way over here to see her, intent on staying perhaps, helping her through this, an effort she’d repaid with rejection.

There was another gentle knock at the door. She didn’t need to look at the reflection to know it was Simon. He walked over and put his hand on her shoulder.

She lifted her own hand, clasping it around his fingers as she said, ‘Sorry.’

‘No, I am. I thought it might cheer you up.’ He paused before saying, ‘They wouldn’t have wanted you to be like this.’ The phrase rang false somehow, like something he’d heard in a schmaltzy TV movie and felt uncomfortable repeating.

‘Wouldn’t they? How do you know?’ She turned to look at him. He looked embarrassed, even afraid. ‘When I die I hope I leave at least one person as heartbroken as I am now. I want people to be sad. I want my life to have meant something.’

He smiled a little. ‘We agreed there’d be no more talk of death.’

‘Just give me this summer. One summer to grieve for a lost family—it’s not too much to ask, is it?’