Her anger burned blue. She stomped to the bathroom to wash her hands, catching sight of her image in the mirror. The wide-eyed nervous girl who had started at the University of Toronto in September was gone. Instead, Julia saw a pale and upset young woman, with pinched lips and flashing eyes. She was no longer the timid Rabbit or the seventeen-year-old Beatrice. She was Julianne Mitchell, almost-MA, and she would be damned if she’d spend the rest of her life simply taking the scraps that others deigned to throw at her.
If he has a message for me, he can damn well say it in person, she thought. I’m not going on a scavenger hunt just so he can assuage his conscience.
Yes, she loved him. Looking at the photograph album he made for her birthday, she knew that she would love him forever. But love was not an excuse for cruelty. She was not a plaything, an Héloise, to be dropped like a pair of dirty socks. If he was breaking things off with her, she’d make him say so to her face. She was simply going to give him until after dinner to do so.
In early evening, she walked to the Manulife Building, the key to Gabriel’s apartment in her pocket. With every step she imagined what she would say. She wouldn’t cry, she promised herself. She would be strong. And she would demand answers.
As she turned the corner and approached the front door, she saw a tall, impeccably dressed blonde exit the building. The woman looked at her watch and tapped her foot impatiently as the doorman waved over a waiting taxi.
Julia hid behind a tree. She peeked around the trunk in order to take another look.
At first glance, she’d thought the woman in question was Paulina; upon inspection she realized her mistake. Julia breathed a sigh of relief as she approached the building. Seeing Paulina with Gabriel on this day of all days would have been devastating. Surely, he wouldn’t do that to her. Gabriel was supposed to be her Dante. He was supposed to love her enough to travel through Hell to protect her, not take Paulina back the moment their relationship was threatened.
With some trepidation, Julia entered the lobby and waved to the security guard, who recognized her. She decided against announcing her presence to Gabriel and took the elevator to his floor. She shivered as she contemplated what she might find in his apartment.
She didn’t bother to knock but simply let herself in, fearing that she’d find Gabriel compromised. But something strange caught her attention as soon as she’d closed the door. All the lights in the apartment were off and the hall closet was open and half-empty, hangers and shoes haphazardly thrown on the floor. It was very unlike Gabriel to leave things in such a mess.
She switched on several lights and placed her key on the table where he always kept his keys. His keys were not to be found.
“Gabriel? Hello?”
She ventured into the kitchen and was shocked by what she found. An empty bottle of Scotch lay on the counter, next to a broken glass. Dirty plates and cutlery were dumped in the sink.
Steeling herself for what she might find, she walked to the fireplace, only to discover a mark on the wall and scattered glass shards on the floor. She could see Gabriel flinging his Scotch in anger, but she had a hard time imagining him leaving broken pieces for someone to step on.
Desperately worried, she crept down the darkened hall and into the master bedroom. Clothes were strewn across the bed, the drawers to Gabriel’s dresser half-opened. His closet was similarly disarrayed, and Julia noticed that many of his clothes were gone as was his large suitcase.
But what caused her to inhale sharply were the walls. All the framed photographs of her, and of Gabriel and her together, had been removed and piled face down on the bed, leaving the walls bare except for the hooks on which the photographs had been hung.
Julia gasped in horror as she saw that the reproduction of Holiday’s painting of Dante and Beatrice had been taken down and was now leaning against the credenza, its back on display.
Shocked, she sank down on a chair. He’s gone, she thought.
Julia burst into tears, wondering how he could have so easily broken his promises. She searched the apartment in vain for a note or some indication of where he’d gone. When she came across the telephone she contemplated calling Rachel. But the thought of having to explain that she and Gabriel were over was too much to bear.
With one last look she turned out all the lights and was about to walk through the door when she stopped. Something niggled at the back of her mind. Closing the door, she returned to Gabriel’s bedroom. Searching with her fingers, she fumbled about, looking for something. When she didn’t find it, she turned on the light.
The photograph that Rachel had taken at Lobby several months earlier was missing. Gabriel always kept it on top of his dresser. In the picture, he and Julia were dancing, and he was looking at her with no little heat.
Julia stood for a moment, looking at the empty space. It was possible, she thought, that he’d destroyed the picture. But a quick inspection of the wastepaper baskets in the bedroom and bathroom suggested he hadn’t thrown it away.
She didn’t understand why he’d left or why he’d left without offering her an explanation, but she began to suspect that all was not as it seemed.