Page 3 of A Sorrow of Truths

No.

“No, you couldn’t,” I murmur, walking away from him towards the door. “Are you coming?”

He chuckles and joins me, opening the door. “After you, Ms Bitch.”

We walk in companionable silence, weaving corridors and halls that have become so familiar I hardly need to look anymore. Left and right mean something now. All the rooms here do. He showed me them, talked me through their meaning or use. It was strange for a time, as if I was being welcomed to a new side of him after that breakfast he made me eat, but then everything began to change and relax.

Normal conversations occurred about why he’s here, who he is, what makes him do what he does. Not money. Money is for fools, he says. Made to be spent and nothing else. No, this place is for living when life outside of it isn’t worth living for. I understood that, even if I didn’t truly understand why. But what he hasn’t done, for the entire time I’ve been here alone, is move on with his game to help me understand Gray.

“Was he fucking someone else?” he asks, as we turn into the formal lounge. I watch as he heads for the drinks and pours us some, not understanding the question, and then watch as he brings it back to me. “Your husband?”

I nod and take the drink from him. “Several. My whole life was a lie. And then he died and I couldn’t get any answers. Gray told me about the affairs, after two gossiping women already had told me about one at his wake. I was in the toilet – wracked with grief.”

“Hmm. Trust shattered.”

I tip the vodka to my mouth and down it. “Yes. I don’t do grief now.”

I shrug and move towards the drinks tray again, gazing at the array of selections available. It is what it is. Nothing more or less. I’ve evolved because of it, found new meaning in things I never knew existed. I’m a new me, unbound and free of lies and deceptions. I pour another shot, downing that as fast as I did the first, and then hold my hand out to Malachi for pills because only Gray proves a challenge now and even I know I should let that go, move on from him.

“But you are doing, Hannah. You’re grieving more for Gray than you did for your husband.”

“I’m not.”

“I warned you.”

“Asshole.”

My fingers waggle, annoyance forcing me into trying to forget. I’m not accepting that argument or my apparent grief. I’ll try again, become stronger, more resilient, and then leave when my own battle has been won. I’ll go back, pack the apartment up that has barely been used, and move. Another state, another country even? I could go anywhere. See anything. Live anywhere. There’s enough money in my account for anything I want, anywhere I want thanks to Rick’s death. Just not for anyone I want. Money is not going to make that happen.

Sadness sweeps through me again, faltering what was trying to harden up. “Why won’t you tell me what he’s hiding, Malachi?” I ask.

“Because you won’t like what you find, Hannah.” He tips some pills into my hand inattentively, not caring for the spill of colours that land. “And I’ve grown to like you enough to care.”

“What happened to better to go too far than not far enough?”

“Sometimes not far enoughisfar enough. For both of you.”

I swallow some pills at yet another non answer, unwilling to choose colours and not caring for their affect anyway, and walk into the hall. What does it matter? I’ll fly for a while, get lost and discover new images to linger in. The dark will come then to tow me under it. Care will abandon me. I’ll connect with something, anything. Dirty, shadowed corners will become my refuge, and time will disintegrate again and minutes will turn into hours and hours into days and days into weeks, until there is no Gray Rothburg. I’ll be truly alone then.

As barren as the landscape around us.

The coloured flashes come hard and fast in my mind. They whirl and spin around me, as I keep moving to the elevator, making me stagger and spin slowly under them.“No, I won’t be, but I am here now.”It repeats over and over and over in my mind, soft words tempting me in to opening my eyes for him. “Be here with me.”

I was. I was there and I felt and I let everything in me fall into him, as if one night was manageable. Stupid. I should have stayed closed off, closed down. I should have kept him away, knowing I couldn’t stay the course when it came to him not being there.

Something moves above my head, as if following me – monsters. I look up sharply, then sideways, sneering at what might be coming. There’s nothing but this dark old cavern and these brittle old walls. Still – I back up to the elevator door, chin held high and eyes focused on the dark – I will not be scared of it if it does come. I will grow. Be strong again.

Gray Rothburg – maybe he’s the monster.

I laugh, as the doors open. My monster. My chemist. My tormentor. Mmm.

Tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap.

No thuds still. Not that I can hear, but I can feel them alongside my tap. Deep. Inside me. Pulsing and banging, bruising what is already battered and aching. Claiming what isn’t his to claim. My nails tear into me, scratching through skin to get to him and scream warnings at myself. Shadows. Dark corners. Men fucking.

Pain.

Malachi arrives before the doors close around me, a glower on his face as he flaps his hand at me to get out of the way. He stalls next to me, looking me over, and then presses the panel for downwards.

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