I look at Alice. She doesn’t seem afraid. Far from it. She looks intrigued.
“I have taken The Pact as far as I can,” Orla continues. “And now it is time for me to let go. I cannot leave this earth without knowing that The Pact will be taken care of, that it will evolve and grow.”
Alice remains motionless beside me. Orla is watching her carefully, and it occurs to me that Orla knew from the beginning exactly how this was going to end.
“In one hand, a leader holds kindness, and in the other, discipline. I have seen that you are capable of finding this balance.” She steps closer. “Jake, Alice, with all my heart, I believe you are the ones to lead The Pact into this new chapter. However, in order to be a great leader, one must be willing. One must accept the responsibility without hesitation, without regret.”
Orla places one hand on my shoulder and the other on Alice’s shoulder. “That is why I am giving you a choice. If you step through the gold door, all of the resources of The Pact will be at your disposal. You will be able to shape it as you see fit. I will stand with you in that chapel, we will stand with Friends, and I will announce you both as our new leaders.”
“And the white door?” Alice asks.
Orla coughs violently, sagging against me, clenching my arm. I feel the surprising strength of her fingers through my suit jacket as I reach out to steady her. Seconds later, she recovers, and she seems to stand taller than before, as if she is summoning all of her strength.
“My dear Jake, my dear Alice, as you know, no one in the history of The Pact has ever been allowed to leave. Never. However, given the significance of what I am asking of you, it is only fair to allow you to choose. The white door is an exit. If you walk through it, your obligations to The Pact will cease immediately. But know this: step out that door and no one will come to save you. No one will come to save Alice. You will be completely on your own. Live or die. Alone.”
I look at Alice, regal in her red dress. Her eyes are shining, her face expectant. I try to figure out what she is thinking—my wife, who is always determined to win. My wife, who contains multitudes.
I imagine walking through the gold door. I can see us moving through the crowd, hands brushing our arms, our backs. I imagine the well-dressed couples, their devotion, that collective embrace. I imagine the hush falling over the crowd as Alice and I step forward, lift our glasses into the air, and utter a single, powerful word: “Friends.”
Alice grasps my hand, and in that moment I know. For better, for worse, she is with me. She pulls me in close and I feel her breath against my neck as she whispers in my ear. Words of encouragement and, yes, something else. Words meant just for me.
I place my hand on the knob and turn.
101
We step out into the desert night. There are millions of stars, more than I’ve ever seen. The lawn beneath our feet is green, still damp from the sprinklers. A hundred yards on is the chain-link fence, eight feet tall, covered with ivy.
Alice slips off her heels and tosses them onto the grass. “Now,” she whispers. We sprint toward the fence. There are no sirens, no flashing lights, just the soft pounding of our feet on the grass.
At the fence, we rip away a cluster of ivy to find a foothold. Side by side, we climb. Despite her days at Fernley, Alice is still strong from her morning sessions at Ocean Beach, and it only takes her a few seconds to scale the fence. We drop down on the other side, onto the cool desert sand. We collapse into each other’s arms, laughing, giddy with our newfound freedom.
It takes us several seconds to catch our breath. They are letting us go.
We both stop laughing. I look into Alice’s eyes, and I know what she is thinking. Are we really on our own?
I imagine a highway far off in the distance, black under the moon, reflecting yellow stripes to point the way home. But I can’t see a highway. Giant cacti dot the landscape. The desert stretches on endlessly. There are no lights from distant towns, no sounds of civilization.
We have only the bottle of water I brought from the room. We’ll have to make good time before the sun comes up and the heat sets in. We begin running, away from Fernley, toward the highway that must be there—somewhere—but the sand is soft and deep, and soon we slow to a jog, then a labored walk. The hem of Alice’s dress drags in the sand.
Eventually, we reach a packed-dirt trail and begin walking along the flat surface, dotted with sharp pebbles. I give Alice my shoes and continue on in my socks. A light arcs across the sky, then another, and another. “A meteor shower,” Alice says. “It’s beautiful.” We each take a sip of water, careful not to spill a drop.
We walk for a long time. My legs ache, my feet are numb. I’m not sure how much time has passed when I notice that Alice has slowed and she is panting. Where is the highway? The stars have disappeared, the moon barely visible as night gives way to twilight. I unscrew the cap from the bottle and urge her to drink.
Alice takes a cautious gulp, then hands me the bottle and drops onto the rocky path. “Let’s just rest for a minute,” she says. I take a sip of water, carefully screw on the cap, and sit beside her.
“There will be a road somewhere, a gas station,” I say.
“Yes, there has to be.”
She puts her fingers on the back of my neck. I kiss her, long and soft, noticing with alarm that her lips are rough and chapped. A terrifying thought crosses my mind: Have we made the wrong choice? But when I reluctantly pull away, I realize that Alice is smiling.
This is the wonderful, complicated woman I married. The woman who lay beside me on the beach during our honeymoon on the Adriatic. The woman who stood in the lobby of the Grand Hotel, dancing slowly around me, singing in full voice the entirety of Al Green’s “Let’s Get Married.” The woman who sat in front of me at the pool on a warm night in Alabama, gazing at the ring I offered, and simply said, “Okay.”
I see in her a resolute determination to move forward, not back, a determination to embrace this strange journey, this marriage, and all of the surprises it holds. A determination to see it through to the end. For better or worse.
Here in the desert, I understand now what I should have seen a long time ago: Our love is strong. Our commitment is solid. I do not need The Pact to hold on to my wife. Yes, marriage is a vast, uncharted territory, and nothing is certain. Still, we will find our own way.
Suddenly, the sky fills with dazzling light as the enormous sun lifts over the horizon. I can hear the wind sweeping across the valley floor. Waves of heat begin to emanate from the earth. Minutes pass and we sit here motionless, transfixed. We are so tired, and there is so far to go. My mind is blank. The relentless sun and the dry air of this strange desert landscape seem to have washed away everything in my life that came before.