“What really happened to Sophia?” Claire interrupts my thoughts, plunging me back into the harsh moment.
Minutes ago, I managed to unleash nineteen years of bitter bottled-up facts about Cath in quick succession. But my recent memories of Sophia are an altogether different matter. Especially in view of what happened after Claire found her snooping about in this room two evenings ago.
My options are reduced to only two possibilities:
(A) tell the truth;
(B) say nothing at all.
I’m inclined to pursue option B. But the whiskey surging through my bloodstream is heightening my instincts instead of dulling them. My intuition insists that if I do not tell Claire what happened to Sophia two evenings ago, I’ll live to regret it. I should explain what happened when I can still remember it. When I still have vivid memories of what occurred the day before yesterday, instead of cold, sterile facts. Because nothing beats the poignant immediacy of memory. It’s like seeing the past in crystalline color instead of in factual black and white.
If I don’t begin talking right now, I might never summon the courage to do so again. I also reckon that Richardson will return to our doorstep before long. He’s become a horrible rash that will never go away.
The wind has picked up once more; its mournful howl echoes outside the windows. I glance at my desk. An empty bottle of whiskey sprawls on its side, devoid of even the tiniest drop.
I clear my throat, causing Claire to jump. This is what I say:
We were having a late dinner two nights ago because you returned from Emily’s around seven. We got into a quarrel about something silly—namely, which Caribbean island we wanted to go to for Christmas. You wanted Nevis, because your diary says you always feel good there. Mentally, emotionally, and physically. I said I wanted to visit a different island for a change, like neighboring Saba. Our discussion degenerated to the point where I stalked back to my study halfway through our meal, abandoning you and my half-eaten roast beef. My rudeness, in hindsight, shames me.
When I drew closer to my study, I realized that the door was ajar. I also heard the soft patter of footsteps inside. I froze in my tracks, stunned by the realization that there was an intruder in the room. But I also became curious as to what the person was up to. Why would anyone be poking about my study in the first place? So I flattened myself against an outer wall and peered into the window to find out what was going on.
I almost collapsed onto the flowerpots below me when I realized that it was a woman who had broken in. The figure was moving about with an ethereal, feline grace that could only be feminine. Yet she was also circling the room in a slightly agitated manner; she resembled a hungry, desperate panther. I squinted; she was clad from head to toe in midnight black. A sinuous sable scarf concealed most of her face.
I pause before walking to my diary safe and tapping in the combination code. Its door slides open. I yank out the Versace scarf; Claire shrinks back as I fling it atop my desk. It unfurls as a long, accusing gash of black over a dog-eared printout of The Serendipity of Being.
With a sigh, I continue my story:
The woman strode up to my safe and tapped its platinum door. She pulled out a small piece of paper from her pocket and studied it. I gasped as she tucked the paper away and began fiddling about with my safe’s combination-code lock. She tapped something into it. A red light flashed in response. She tried again. The red light flickered once more. This time, I heard her cursing vigorously under her breath. She hesitated for a long while before reaching forward and tapping in a third set of numbers.
A foghorn tore into the night, shredding the silence.
She froze, raising her hand to her lips.
The siren mutated into a shrill two-tone clamor, alternating between loud and twice as loud. She began backing slowly away from the safe, hand still covering her mouth.
The alarm grew even louder.
It drilled my ears.
It went on.
On and on.
At some point I couldn’t bear it anymore. I burst through the study door, shot past the woman, and tapped in the correct code. The door of the safe slid open, cutting off the siren.
I turned around to face her. We stared at each other in suspended animation for what seemed like an agonizing eternity. Somehow the ensuing silence seemed twice as deafening.
“You’re such a disappointment, Mark,” she said, pulling out the piece of paper again and waving it at me. I blinked; the words on the note said: “The birth date of the love of my life, and mine.”
I couldn’t believe my ears. Or my eyes. Because it was Sophia Ayling who was speaking to me, behind that black scarf.
“How did you get that—”
“Thought I’d worked it all out,” she said, shaking her head with a disapproving tut. “That you used my birth date. Or that of the daughter you once had. Your poor little Catherine Louise. Shame it wasn’t either one. I even tried your own birth date, repeated twice.”
“What the hell—”
“But you rescued me in time,” she added. “The safe’s open now. That’s all that matters.”
Multiple questions surged to my head. How on earth did Sophia know that we once had a daughter named Catherine Louise, let alone Cath’s birth date? And why was she trying to raid my safe? Nothing made sense to me. Nothing at all. I blinked in bewilderment as she strode back up to the safe, ran a finger along the rows of my old diaries, and pulled out the volume labeled “June–September 1996.”
“I hope you won’t mind me borrowing this moldy little masterpiece of yours for a couple of days,” she said with a chuckle.
“What on earth…”
Just then, a soft rustling sounded at the door. We both turned around in surprise. My mouth fell open when I realized that you were standing at the threshold with a covered dinner plate bearing the remains of the meal I’d abandoned on the dining table.
“I heard an alarm,” you said, taking a couple of steps forward and trailing off into petrified silence.
You stared at Sophia. Sophia stared at you. And I stared at you both. It became an unblinking three-way exchange. Between three people frozen by circumstance. By the horror of their colliding paths. By the agony of knowing that things would never be the same again.
Color slid away from your face, turning it corpse white.
What have I done? I thought. What have I done to you? To us?
Sophia was the first to recover. She yanked her scarf off and dropped it on the floor, revealing her face and her glossy mane of blond hair. It struck me just how similar the two of you looked.
“Had your man for two long years,” she said to you, her lips curling up into a mocking sneer. “All to myself. After all, there’s only so much fucking a man can do.”
She smirked as she began sauntering to the door, diary still in hand.