There were still too many questions, too much memory—but one of them had to make a start, and the Murderer, rightfully, cracked first. If anyone was to attempt a sense of partnership, it should be him. They’d walked many miles together that day, and so he looked at him, and asked:
“You want to build a bridge?”
Clay nodded but looked away.
“Thanks,” said Michael.
“For what?”
“For coming.”
“I didn’t come here for you.”
Family bonding, the Clay way.
In many ways, I guess it’s true, that even bad times are full of good times (and great times) and the time of their demise was no different. There were still those Sunday mornings, when she’d ask him to read to her in bed, and she’d kiss him with her morning breath, and Michael could only surrender. He’d gladly read The Quarryman. He’d first run a finger on the lettering.
She’d say, “What was the name of that place again, where he learned about marble, and stone?”
Quietly, he’d answer.
The town was Settignano.
Or, “Read what it says about the Prisoners again.”
Page 265:
“They were wild and twisted—unfashioned, incomplete—but they were colossal, monumental anyway, and would fight, it seemed, for forever.”
“For forever?” She’d roll onto him and kiss his stomach; she’d always loved his stomach. “Is that a misprint, do you think?”
“No, I think he meant it. He’s gambling on us thinking it’s a mistake…imperfect, like the Slaves.”
“Huh.” She’d kiss and kiss again, across and over, up toward his ribcage. “I love it when you do that.”
“Do what?”
“Fight for what you love.”
* * *
—
But he couldn’t fight for her.
Or at least, not how she wanted.
To be fair, there was nothing malicious in Abbey Dunbar, but as time widened and the good moments shortened, it became clearer, each day, that their lives were going separate ways. More to the point, she was changing, he stayed the same. Abbey never took aim or attacked him. It just got slippery, the hanging on.
Looking back, Michael remembered movies. He remembered times when the entire Friday-night cinema laughed, when he laughed, and Abbey sat watching, unfazed. Then, when the whole brigade of moviegoers was dead silent, Abbey would smile at something private, just her and the screen. If only he could have laughed when she did, maybe they’d have been okay—
But he stopped himself.
That was ridiculous.
Movies and plastic popcorn don’t increase the chances of decimation, do they? No, it was more a compilation: a greatest hits of two people who’d traveled as far as they could together, to fade away.
* * *