“Hello, sweetheart,” Terry said in a softer tone than anything he’d managed for days.
“Terry?” His wife’s voice was instantly concerned. “Where are you? You haven’t called all day and I’ve left a dozen messages—”
“Sarah…things are really bad right now. ”
She paused, then said, “Yes, I know. Rachel Weinstock called me and told me some of what was going on. She said Saul was pretty rattled about an autopsy he had to perform. ”
“Pretty bad right now,” Terry said again. He could feel his eyes filling with tears.
“Are you okay, honey?”
God didn’t save you, either. God won’t save this town, Terry.
“I’m…”
And you know what he wants from you. You see that, too. You see that every time you look in the mirror.
“Terry?”
Terry, the only way to not be like him is to be like me.
“I’m just tired, Sarah. ”
“Can you get away? Can you come home?”
Tears were running freely down his face now. He took the full bottle of Xanax from his pocket, popped the lid off with his thumb, and poured the pills out onto the table next to his chair. Twenty-?two pills. More than enough.
“Terry,” she repeated, “can you get away?”
“I don’t know,” he answered softly. “Maybe. Maybe there’s a way I can get free. ”
“Please come home, Terry,” Sarah begged. “You can’t run yourself into the ground like this. ”
“No,” he said.
“Will you try?”
“Yes. ”
“I’ll wait up. ”
Terry squeezed his eyes shut against a wave of grief and pain. The image of Sarah’s face burned in his mind—dark eyes flashing, thick fall of straight black hair just touched by a few strands of gray, a laughing mouth—and he fought not to sob out loud.
Terry, the only way to not be like him is to be like me.
“Call you later, sweetheart,” he said, when he could master himself enough to keep everything out of his voice.
“I love you, Terry. ”
“I love you, Sarah. With all my heart. ”
He disconnected and dropped the phone on the floor. With a growl of mingled anger and fear and heartbreak he swept all the pills into his hand and held the closed fist above his upturned mouth.
His upraised fist trembled with a palsy born of a dreadful inner conflict and slowly, as if moving against an almost irresistible force, he lowered his hand down to the level of his lips…and then down farther, past chin and chest until the clenched fist lay in his lap. Tears ran down his cheeks and his lips trembled with sobs.
“No!” he said in a hoarse and alien voice that was filled with a rage of passion.
Sarah had said, Please come home, Terry.