Dark Matter(92)

“This other Jason looked at me like that, and there was this new energy between us. Kind of like how it feels when you come home after a weekend at one of your conferences, but way more intense.”

I ask, “So with him, it must’ve been like the first time we were together?”

She doesn’t answer right away.

Just breathes for a while.

Then says finally, “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“After a couple weeks, it hit me that this wasn’t a one-night, or even one-weekend, kind of thing. I realized that something in you had changed.”

“What was different?”

“A million little things. The way you dressed. The way you got ready in the morning. The things you talked about at dinner.”

“The way I f*cked you?”

“Jason.”

“Please don’t lie to me. That, I can’t take.”

“Yes. It was different.”

“Better.”

“Like it was the first time again. You did things you never did. Or hadn’t in a long time. It was like I was something, not that you wanted, but that you needed. Like I was your oxygen.”

“Do you want this other Jason?”

“No. I want the man I’ve made a life with. The man I made Charlie with. But I need to know you’re that man.”

I sit up and look at her in this cramped, windowless bathroom in the middle of nowhere that smells faintly of mildew.

She looks at me.

So tired.

Struggling onto my feet, I give her a hand up.

We move into the bedroom.

Daniela climbs into bed, and I hit the lights and crawl in beside her under the freezing sheets.

The frame is creaky, and the slightest movement bangs the headboard against the wall, which rattles the picture frames.

She’s wearing underwear and a white T-shirt, and she smells like she’s been riding in the car all day without a shower—fading deodorant tinged with funk.

I love it.

She whispers in the dark, “How do we fix this, Jason?”

“I’m working on it.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means ask me again in the morning.”

Her breath in my face is sweet and warm.

The essence of everything I associate with home.

She’s asleep within a moment, breathing deeply in and out.

I think I’m right behind her, but when I close my eyes, my thoughts run rampant. I see versions of me stepping out of elevators. In parked cars. Sitting on the bench across the street from our brownstone.

I see me everywhere.

The room is dark except for the coils of the space heater glowing in the corner.

The house lies silent.

I can’t sleep.

I need to fix this.

Quietly, I slide out from under the covers. At the door, I stop and glance back at Daniela, safe under a mountain of blankets.

I head down the noisy hardwood floor of the hallway, the house getting warmer the closer I get to the living room.

The fire is already low.

I add several logs.

For a long time, I sit just staring into the flames, watching the wood slowly crumble into the radiant bed of embers as my son snores softly behind me.

The idea first occurred to me on the drive north today, and I’ve been mulling it over ever since.

It seemed insane at first.

But the more I pressure-check it, the more it seems like my only option.

In the living room beside the entertainment center, there’s a desk with a ten-year-old Mac and a dinosaur printer. I power the computer on. If there’s a password required or no Internet connection, this will have to wait until tomorrow, when I can find an Internet café or coffee shop in town.

I’m in luck. There’s a guest login option.

I open the web browser and access that asonjayessenday email account.

The hyperlink still works.

Welcome to UberChat!

There are currently seventy-two active participants.

Are you a new user?



I click No and log in with my username and password.

Welcome back Jason9!

Logging you into UberChat now!



The conversation is much longer, with so many participants I break out in a cold sweat.

I scan everything, down through the most recent message, which is less than a minute old.


Jason42: The house has been empty since at least midafternoon.

Jason28: So which of you did this?

Jason4: I followed Daniela from 44 Eleanor St. to the police station on North California.

Jason14: What was she doing there?

Jason25: What was she doing there?

Jason10: What was she doing there?

Jason4: No idea. She went inside, never came out. Her Honda is still there.

Jason66: Does this mean she knows? Is she still in the police station?

Jason4: I don’t know. Something is up.

Jason49: I was nearly killed last night by one of us. He got a key to my hotel room and came in with a knife in the middle of the night.



I start typing…

Jason9: DANIELA AND CHARLIE ARE WITH ME.

Jason92: Safe?

Jason42: Safe?

Jason14: How?

Jason28: Prove it.

Jason4: Safe?