“What’s that supposed to mean?” I say.
“Maybe it’s not that you gave him those things, like a gift,” Penny says. “Maybe it’s that you stole all that from him. Because you needed it. And when you receded, for whatever reason, you carried off some important pieces of him with you. And left him without them.”
“That’s not . . . no, that doesn’t make sense,” I say.
“Right,” she says, “because the rest of this makes complete sense. You said to me last week that you wondered if you were more sexist than you realized because you never grew up with a sister, the way he did. The thing is, Greta doesn’t strike me as someone who’d take a milligram of shit from a brother like the man in my bed yesterday morning. I don’t have any siblings, so I don’t know how blind you can be to their damage. I know everyone thinks he’s a bit detached and distant. But that’s not the same as what I saw in his, in your, eyes. It was angry and cold. Like your evil twin showed up looking just like you in every way except the light in his eyes and the cadence of his speech.”
“It wasn’t me,” I say. “You understand that, right?”
“I understand you believe you didn’t do any of the things he did,” she says. “To me or to that girl. But it was your body. Your body handled me the way he handled me. Your body was with her, doing who knows what, things she apparently didn’t like very much but that you conveniently can’t remember.”
“I’m not trying to minimize what it felt like for you or for her,” I say, “but this whole thing feels like a horror movie to me too.”
“Well,” she says, “that sounds really tough for you, Tom.”
“Penny . . .”
“No, that’s great,” she says, “congratulations, you managed to screw your intern, so original, and then convince her you’re actually a super-nice and thoughtful guy who just has a bit of a twisty dark side when it suits him. And here you are to convince me of the same thing, right? That it wasn’t you. It was him. You’re not responsible. You’re pure and innocent and sweet and you say just the right thing and you really listen and you would never treat me like that. It’s funny because people say the perfect guy doesn’t exist. And yet I found him. Except of course he literally doesn’t exist.”
“I’m far from perfect,” I say, “but I’m not like him.”
“It’s not just what would happen if you were gone forever,” Penny says. “It’s what would happen if he came back. When I woke up, it really did feel like a nightmare. It had that illogical wrongness to it. You’re with the man you love but he’s someone else, even though he looks exactly the same and there’s no evidence, except for the way he speaks and moves and touches you. After, I thought if I went in the shower with you it would wake me up enough to snap out of it. Like I’d been sleepwalking. I’d look you in the eye and you’d be back and whatever happened in my bed was just a bad dream. But it wasn’t. It was him, saying you’re gone forever. And now you’re here, but how long before he comes back again?”
“I won’t let him come back.”
“You don’t know what you’ll let,” Penny says. “I can’t even be sure it’s you.”
“It’s me. I promise you it’s me.”
“What does that even mean, it’s me, coming from you?” she says.
I catch myself before I speak because—what does it mean? I’m still unclear on what exactly I did to Penny but, whatever it was, it was done with my skin and bones and muscles and nerves, the same lungs breathed the air and the same heart pumped the blood and the same brain that’s clogged with staticky dread and guilt for acts I didn’t even commit, except that I did, apparently, that same brain set the whole chain of events in motion. I feel like someone whose dog just ravaged a neighbor who strayed too close to his property, except I’m the dog and clearly not the master of anything that matters.
This gap between us, it isn’t just empty space. It’s a black hole and I don’t know that we’ll ever escape it. I don’t know what’s going to happen next. But I do know one thing—I have to find a way to kill John.
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