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“No. Go away, Phil.” She gave him a shove and he stumbled backwards a few steps, and pulled something out of his pocket. It was a gun.
“I mean it,” he said. “I’d rather see us both dead than see you throw yourself away on him.”
She should have been more frightened, but it all felt like a dream to her. “No,” she said quietly. “You’re not going to frighten me anymore. I don’t believe a word you say, Phil. Not one. I’m not stupid or ugly, I have talents. I have friends who care about me. You can’t make me feel like nothing anymore. I won’t give you that power again.”
“I mean it,” he said, but his voice was shaking, and so was his hand.
“Put the gun down, Phil. You won’t shoot me. You certainly won’t shoot yourself.”
“You think I won’t?” he demanded, his voice becoming shrill. “You think I won’t?” And he lifted the gun, brought it up fast to point it at his head.
Whether he meant to shoot, or whether it was accidental, Sophia would never know, but there was a terrible, echoing report, and Phil crumpled, leaving a spray of blood on the glass behind him.
Sophia, rooted to the spot, could not even scream. She stood there and stared as the pool of blood spread out underneath Phil’s head, stared as people began to crowd into the vestibule, and the police were called.
“Are you all right?” someone asked, and Sophia could not even speak.
Once Daniel arrived, he sat with her, holding her hand while she spoke to the police. She said that she didn’t think Phil meant to pull the trigger, that he had never had a gun as far as she knew, and probably didn’t understand basic gun safety. “I think he meant to prove a point and his finger slipped.”
She told them what he’d said, what she’d said, and she expected them to give her that look that said she was responsible for this as surely as if she’d pulled the trigger. That she should have been nicer to Phil. But surprisingly, the two officers seemed sympathetic.
“You’ll take care of her?” the female officer asked Daniel, and he nodded.
He took her upstairs and poured her a glass of brandy. “Get yourself around this.”
“It’s okay,” she said.
“Something like this isn’t really okay, Sophia, it just gets further away with time.” He drew her a hot bath, and afterward put her to bed.
When she woke after hearing the sound of the gunshot in a dream, he was sleeping beside her, curled up against her back, one arm thrown over her waist. It made the bad things fade away enough for her to fall asleep again.
The next morning, she woke to the smell of coffee. She threw on her robe and padded out to the kitchen where Daniel was making toast. “You’re up! How you feeling?” he asked.
“I don’t know, really. A little uneasy, but not as rattled as I’d have imagined. The weirdest thing: When I woke up just now, I lay there in bed thinking about decorating the bedroom. Isn’t that strange?” She rubbed her forehead.
“Headache?”
“No, just a bit tense.” The memory of that pool of blood rushed back and she jumped off the stool and raced for the bathroom where she threw up.
Daniel came and held her hair back, and gave her cold water to rinse her mouth.
“I thought about… I don’t want to talk about it, but, what happened, it’s like a movie that plays inside my head at weird moments.” Her hands were shaking.
“Come and have some coffee and toast.”
“Make it tea with dry toast and I’m there,” she joked.
“Whatever you need.” He got her settled on the couch, under an afghan and brought her a cup of tea and a plate of unbuttered toast which she devoured.
“Better?” he asked.
“Much. I was starving.”
“You didn’t eat dinner last night, so it’s not a huge surprise.”
“No.”
“Feel like talking about it?”
