9
He goes back and forth in his mind, attempting to catalogue the aliases and the locations. She was April in India, and Susie came before that, but where were they? Did they live in the bungalow in Indonesia, or was it on the outskirts of Bombay? Where did he sell his watch? Were they still in Hong Kong? He cannot remember all of her aliases, let alone his, and the places blur. The goats bleating outside their window might've been Calcutta, but it might've been Kerala and why can he only remember the time they spent in India? Where did they go after India? And what were they named?
When they were in these foreign countries, where their documentations were false and sloppy but no one cared or checked and their names were changed every week without fail and their language was their own; he possessed her, she was his, because she was all he had. She knew this and belonged to him and was happy because she loved him and they lied together and lost themselves together and were the only two in the world that could understand the other. They were poor and happy, eating oranges for dinner and sleeping on a pallet on a dirt floor of a one-room hut in what was essentially a jungle. It was the other people that made for problems, because passerbys he could keep away. Did the problems start in Algeria? He cannot remember. They looked over their shoulders and she held her skirts up- because she wore long skirts then, flowing and so like the natives- but when he would stop and pick her up to whirl her around out of the sheer joy of being she'd throw her head back and laugh instead of looking at him in disgust and pushing him away.
One night, after Syria but before Armenia, he remembers her blissfully trekking through a field to the next town, her hair the closest to her natural color that she'd had in months, and she'd suddenly looked at him and declared that she loved him, point blank, like she'd never said it and he'd never heard it and she'd never loved anyone. He compares that image of her to the one he has now- the sleek, prowling image with bi-monthly hair appointments and lethal but careless wet jobs she was paid extraordinarily for.
The woman he loved (loves?) was the woman she was, the one who told him the whole truth, always, or often enough to fool him. The person she is now omits and lies coolly to his face and clutches at him desperately when he burns himself on the truth. She loves some version of him, maybe the one she remembers from years ago, the one that died when he saw the ashes, or maybe the one that she feels saved her from Hong Kong, or maybe one of the hundreds of men he has become for her. He loved the woman she once was, but he wasn't sure he could do that, love someone for she they used to be, or a portion of that person. Love was the whole thing, right, not bits and pieces. Maybe they were getting it wrong and that is why they are being punished.
One night, he gets feverish from spending too much time in a park while vacating the apartment so as to maintain Julia's cover, and it was Sydney's cool hands that slipped aspirin between his lips and coaxed him to swallow water, that rested on his hot face, Sydney that answered his mumbled questions and soothed his seeking hands. Her visits now were few and far between, and they alternately broke his heart and bolstered his courage. If he could only continue to live between visits he'd be fine.
He dreams that he is home and his wife is sitting at the kitchen table in the morning. "Darling," she says as he walks towards her wordlessly, desiring her comfort like he had as a child with his mother. He embraces her, surrounded by her scent and her normalcy. She doesn't ask questions as he releases her and sits across from her in a pool of sunshine. She fixes him coffee, making idle chatter, her smooth pale hands stirring his coffee because he never told her he liked it black. She wraps both hands around the mug before she hands it to him, her soft hands warm as she touches his face. She does not condemn him for having left, she is happy he has come home. Her hair is lighter than he remembers.
She smiles uncertainly over his shoulder when the door opens, a manicured hand coming to her throat as the shadow crosses him. A possessive hand on his shoulder.
"Would you like some coffee?" his wife asks hesitantly.
"No, thank you. He stopped by to say goodbye, didn't you?"
He grips his mug so tightly he fears it might break, gulping the scalding liquid down, hoping to absorb whatever magic his wife has. She can withstand the power standing behind him. She can stand tall and look her in the eye and see her for what she is. He gets chills from feeling her hand on his shoulder.
His wife watches and she leans down and whispers that it's time to go, taking the mug from his hand and putting it down on the table. He stands up, unable to resist. He looks at his wife pleadingly. She steps forward.
There is no competition. The safety of his wife is what he needs, not what he desires. And so he leaves the kitchen, the coffee and the wife and the sunlight of security to live within this shadow of his captor.
He wakes up next to her and prays without words.
He will escape, he decides, thinking coldly with the rational side of his mind. He will not be her poetic justice, nor will she be his: the man who survived death twice over drowning amongst the living; his committing suicide by killing her, his life.
He once promised some higher power that he would sacrifice anything to have her back, anything for her to be alive and well and with him. He did not realize that fate was so literal. He had promised anything, they had chosen his life, and here he was sacrificing it.
No more. When she came home from the hair appointment or the job she had, he'd tell her. He'd find the strength the leave. And he would not come back.
He has no illusions: leaving her will kill him. It is the matter of his death that bothers him- he is not long for this world no matter what he does. He does not expect justice or fairness or relief, he expects things to end. His greatest joy and his greatest torment is her.
He has just finished rationalizing his resolution to leave when she opens the door and runs into the house, her hair mussed and blood trickling out of her mouth. She cries with her mouth open, her face wet with tears, and she comes at him desperately, attempting to throw her arms around him.
He pushes her away. She steps back, stunned. "Vaughn," she says unsteadily, the shock bringing her a step closer to sanity, "Vaughn- they know."
"Know what?" He will calm her. He will get her settled, complacent, and then he will leave.
"They know who I am. They know my name, they know who you are- we need to leave."
She comes closer, invades him, her hands on his face, steadying him. "They're coming for me, Vaughn, not for you. You must go. They won't look for you, they only want me- you need to go."
And, heaven help him, he thinks quickly that she has given him his freedom.
And in that same instant he knows he'd never take it.
"No- Sydney-" And they are gripping and pushing and crying and it does no good because neither will run. Somewhere along the line their self-preservation screw has fallen loose and now it's too far gone.
They enter quickly, the men with the guns, and quietly, which is strange because he expects a lot of noise and violence. She stands tall, regal in spite of her appearance and demands the name of their employer. They give her the respect she deserves, their tone and inflection properly subdued, her name preceded by a "Miss". Their phrases are punctuated by the guns they point regretfully at her. He is a non-entity.
She is dangerous and suddenly Sydney. She starts questioning them, too many questions. They grow impatient, their words clipping shorter and shorter, her name spat out distastefully. They do not want to force her. They, too, want her body to remain unbruised. They think she acts this way because she's a pistol. He knows she's trying to distract them from him.
Calling attention to himself serves no purpose. He knows this. He is once again helpless in a situation of someone else's design. He hates being a pawn.
They cock their guns, readying to shoot. They offer her once last time to cooperate. She smiles sweetly and declines. They aim.
He lunges.
Checkmate.
There is an explosion, and, true to form, there is an onslaught of images behind his eyes. He blinks them aside, lingering on memory of her dancing in the rain in Indonesia, choosing instead to look into her eyes, she who has disabled the men who did this to him, their bodies limp on the ground. Her mouth drips blood. He tastes it.
He always imagined that he would have something profound to say as his final words- something memorable, prophetic, poetic. But there are no words in this moment, not with her hands weakly stroking his face, blood in both of their mouths. This is what it is like to be lost.
There is only the single prayer he can remember.
"Sydney."
The end.
This is the final section of 'perdition'- something that needed to be written. Love it, hate it, laughed it? Let me know. Thanks for coming along for the ride.