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It’s starting to rain.
5
GABRIEL
Whatever happensat the Bettencourt house is not my problem.
My feelings about driving away and leaving Elise and Lydia there have no bearing on the situation. Those feelings are a mistake. Getting attached is a mistake. When you’re on the way out, it can’t be anythingbuta mistake to make it harder on everyone.
You don’t have to do this.
“She thinks I kissed her out of some kind of revenge obligation.” I’m aware that I’m alone in the SUV, answering a voice in my head that sounds enough like my mother to make it impossible to stop. Normally I talk to her once a year, on the anniversary of the fire. I speak to her while I look at her shared grave with my father. I leave flowers for them. If this ends in my death, too, I won’t have another chance. “She thinks I had to force myself.”
Did you?
I’m just imagining her. That’s all. I loved my dad, but I talked to Mom. We went to breakfast together. We made our own secret plans.
“Never. I wanted to kiss her the moment I saw her. That doesn’t mean I want to get attached.”
Sometimes a person can’t help it.
“She couldn’t feel the difference.” I sound angry. Astonished. “I tried to explain, and she turned around and left. And nowIwant to go back for her. Unbelievable.”
Go back and do what?
“My point exactly. What would I do then? Tell her that I think about her all the time and miss her constantly? Whisk her and her sister off to fuck-knows-where?”
Gabriel.She scolds, but she laughs. That was my mom.You could go back.
“No. It doesn’t matter if she’s the first person I’ve wanted to be with. In years. It doesn’t matter if Lydia is a sweet girl getting mixed up with assholes. It’s not my fault. It’s not my problem.”
You’re thinking about it an awful lot for something that’s not your problem.
“I’m not going back for her.”
I drive to work instead, rain making everything slick and gray.
“You should know that. I belong in the office, not driving all over the city helping Elise and her family. I don’t care about her that way. And it’s setting them up for failure. She can’t learn to depend on me.”
Because you’re not dependable?
“Did I seem that way to you?”
You seemed like my son.
“You were always dependable. Until you weren’t. I shouldn’t have reminded her to call me. Nobody should plan on having me around.”
Not Mason. Not Jameson. Not Remy.
Not Elise Bettencourt.
Why?
“Because the world will be a better place. The consortium will be powerless. They won’t be able to hurt anyone else. And some of the damage they created will be neatly erased with them. I won’t be able to hurt anyone else, either.”
Oh, Gabriel.
“Don’toh, Gabrielme. I know what I’m talking about.”
