A large abstract modernist painting covers the landing wall of the staircase, a curled black form falling, tumbling down into a gray void.
We stand on the cusp of two staircases: up or down.
The camera tilts up and we glide to the top, where a light glows through an ajar door.
We stop suddenly on the penultimate step. The video has no sound but the abrupt stop makes it clear enough that there is sound coming from inside the room.
We freeze mid-step, recalibrate, then continue, closer to the wall now. Slowly, warily, we approach.
Through the gap we see a master bedroom. It takes up the entire top floor of the house, a modern loft conversion painted in the same earthy tones as the rest of the house.
We see her first. She is in her mid-thirties, and statuesque; her soft chestnut hair hangs loosely about her shoulders, her pale skin blotched red with emotion. She is one of the women from the street I saw on the morning I moved in. She is crying as she listens, her body moving with it, as she gestures in agreement.
Whoever is talking is not visible from here.
The woman is half-dressed, in a tailored midi skirt and a silk camisole, the contours of her breasts visible through the silk.
She’s beautiful, even though her eyes are wild and her mascara is smudged. She gesticulates suddenly in what looks like apology. It is desperate and exposing; she did not look like this when I saw her, the day I arrived, on the street. Back then, she was put together, in control. Now she is a raw nerve.
The person she is pleading with comes into the shot, entering the frame as he interrupts her.
Only the back of him is visible. He is tall, physically imposing, his hair short and ashy blond. I do not recognize him. It is clear that he is angry.
I let the video play on, my attention glued to the screen.
He is shouting at her—we can tell from the movement of his shoulders and back, the way he is gesturing, sharp and sudden. Tiny in his shadow, she nods timidly, alive to every word he utters.
Help Me.
It could have been her. But why not just leave, why not scream—but then I know the answer to that: changing your life is easier said than done.
Whether she wrote the message on Blue’s collar or not, this looks bad.
The woman’s focus on him does not waver. She is shaking her head softly.
Suddenly, he appears in the shot again.
We can see his face now, his blue eyes, his handsome features contorted with anger and ugliness. His hands grasping tight on her arms as he whispers something unseen, into her ear, before pulling back.
She nods furiously, her eyes wild, her face flushed and strained.
Her lips form three words; even at this distance I can read them.
I love you.
Chapter 12
The Moral Gray Area
I’m aware that I shouldnot have seen this.
I scan the coffee shop again, feeling like my guilt must be glowing, a throbbing beacon that everyone can see.
I cringe at the realization that I put Blue’s old ID disc onto the new collar, too, my phone number and his name emblazoned on it, though it would not have been immediately visible behind the camera fob.
I need to remove the tag—that much is clear.
I grab my phone from the table, remembering the “Missing” photo of Blue there, too, and I quickly scroll up past the offers of free secondhand dining chairs, baby bouncers, and last-minute concert tickets to the texts I sent about Blue.
