put it off no longer: the time had come for me to tell Adair about the nightmares. I assumed that he would be none too pleased, because the dreams involved his rival, Jonathan. Adair wouldn’t care if Jonathan was being tormented in the depths of hell—he might even get a measure of satisfaction from it—and I hadn’t yet thought of a way to make him care enough about Jonathan’s fate to help me.
“I need your help,” I said timidly. That made his face light up; my request had made him happy. He wanted to be of service to me. Perhaps he thought I’d come to ask for money or some other little thing that he could easily grant. It wasn’t going to be that simple. I took a deep breath, and began to tell him about the dreams.
FOUR
A dair did nothing as I spoke. He kept a neutral expression fixed on his face as he listened, sitting with one leg crossed over the other, his hands clasped and index fingers steepled. Occasionally, he tapped his index fingers together or bounced his right foot up and down. His unresponsiveness made me nervous, and the possible reasons raced in the back of my mind: he must be disappointed to learn that I’d come because of Jonathan, not for him. Or maybe he thought I was foolish to presume the dreams had any meaning at all. I worried, too, that after giving him the reason for turning up unannounced on his doorstep, my audience with him would be over. Or worse, that the truth might reawaken the sleeping dragon that was his fierce temper, and that was the last thing I wanted to do.
But he didn’t appear to be angry. When I’d finished tellinghim about the nightmares, my voice tapering off to embarrassed, self-conscious silence, he said, “Why, Lanore, I’m surprised that you would let something like this bother you! You said so yourself: these are dreams, nothing more than that.”
“I’m not so sure,” I replied.
“Of course they are. And you know as well as I do that you’re having these nightmares because something is bothering you. Perhaps there is something on your conscience? Something you feel guilty about?”
My cheeks warmed at the thought. The list of things of which I was guilty was very long indeed. “Of course I do. I’m only human.”
He knew I was being evasive. “What I meant is: Do you feel guilty about something that deals with Jonathan? Something that also has to do with this dead man, the doctor?”
There was. It was a shameful secret that I’d carried in my heart ever since Luke helped me escape from St. Andrew four years ago. He smuggled me past the police and held me together emotionally after I’d given Jonathan the mercy killing he wanted.
I never got over the feeling that I’d used Luke in the most horrible way, charming him into becoming a fugitive in order to help me. Sure, he had wanted to do it; it wasn’t as though I could force him to do something against his will. But I saw that he was vulnerable: his wife had left him for her high-school sweetheart and moved far away with their daughters, and his parents—for whom he’d relocated to that tiny, isolated town, in order to care for them—had just died. He was alone and morbidly depressed; anyone who looked at him would’ve been able to see it.
After he transported me out of town and across the border to Canada and safety, I should’ve sent him back. I often wondered if it wouldn’t have been kinder if I’d slipped out on him while he’d slept at the motel. On waking and seeing I’d gone, he would’ve returned to St. Andrew, embarrassed and resentful for having been duped, but he’d go on to have a normal life. It would’ve been like releasing an animal back into nature instead of trying to keep him as a pet.
But Luke wasn’t the only lonely one: until Jonathan had come back into my life at the very end, my life had been empty. What had life become for me except a series of relationships, going from one companion to the next to keep loneliness at bay? When the companion was
“I need your help,” I said timidly. That made his face light up; my request had made him happy. He wanted to be of service to me. Perhaps he thought I’d come to ask for money or some other little thing that he could easily grant. It wasn’t going to be that simple. I took a deep breath, and began to tell him about the dreams.
FOUR
A dair did nothing as I spoke. He kept a neutral expression fixed on his face as he listened, sitting with one leg crossed over the other, his hands clasped and index fingers steepled. Occasionally, he tapped his index fingers together or bounced his right foot up and down. His unresponsiveness made me nervous, and the possible reasons raced in the back of my mind: he must be disappointed to learn that I’d come because of Jonathan, not for him. Or maybe he thought I was foolish to presume the dreams had any meaning at all. I worried, too, that after giving him the reason for turning up unannounced on his doorstep, my audience with him would be over. Or worse, that the truth might reawaken the sleeping dragon that was his fierce temper, and that was the last thing I wanted to do.
But he didn’t appear to be angry. When I’d finished tellinghim about the nightmares, my voice tapering off to embarrassed, self-conscious silence, he said, “Why, Lanore, I’m surprised that you would let something like this bother you! You said so yourself: these are dreams, nothing more than that.”
“I’m not so sure,” I replied.
“Of course they are. And you know as well as I do that you’re having these nightmares because something is bothering you. Perhaps there is something on your conscience? Something you feel guilty about?”
My cheeks warmed at the thought. The list of things of which I was guilty was very long indeed. “Of course I do. I’m only human.”
He knew I was being evasive. “What I meant is: Do you feel guilty about something that deals with Jonathan? Something that also has to do with this dead man, the doctor?”
There was. It was a shameful secret that I’d carried in my heart ever since Luke helped me escape from St. Andrew four years ago. He smuggled me past the police and held me together emotionally after I’d given Jonathan the mercy killing he wanted.
I never got over the feeling that I’d used Luke in the most horrible way, charming him into becoming a fugitive in order to help me. Sure, he had wanted to do it; it wasn’t as though I could force him to do something against his will. But I saw that he was vulnerable: his wife had left him for her high-school sweetheart and moved far away with their daughters, and his parents—for whom he’d relocated to that tiny, isolated town, in order to care for them—had just died. He was alone and morbidly depressed; anyone who looked at him would’ve been able to see it.
After he transported me out of town and across the border to Canada and safety, I should’ve sent him back. I often wondered if it wouldn’t have been kinder if I’d slipped out on him while he’d slept at the motel. On waking and seeing I’d gone, he would’ve returned to St. Andrew, embarrassed and resentful for having been duped, but he’d go on to have a normal life. It would’ve been like releasing an animal back into nature instead of trying to keep him as a pet.
But Luke wasn’t the only lonely one: until Jonathan had come back into my life at the very end, my life had been empty. What had life become for me except a series of relationships, going from one companion to the next to keep loneliness at bay? When the companion was
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