No One Knows Us Here(74)

My body felt light from the relief of it, for shedding this story I’d been dragging around for the last five months. A gust of wind could carry me off, into the clouds. I imagined my symptoms disappearing before his eyes, the rash fading, my hair regrowing, the color to my skin returning. My fingers would shrink down to their normal size, and the diamond ring would fall off my finger, bounce off the roof, and disappear down a storm drain.

Sam didn’t say anything, not at first. He saw me shiver, and he pulled off his sweater so he could drape it over my shoulders. I tightened it around me by the sleeves like a cape. He placed an arm around me and pulled me close, and we both looked out at the city below. We could see farther than I had expected, from way up here. The buildings downtown, the river below, the bridges, the mountains. Raindrops pelted down on us. It was a slow, fat rain. Sporadic. Minutes between drops.

We turned toward each other, and my hair flew out from behind me, into Sam’s face. Our eyes locked, and then a look of resolve settled onto Sam’s features. He leaned in, and I thought he was going to kiss me, but he only brought me in for another embrace. We stood like that, holding each other, my head against his chest, for what felt like a long time.

“Call the police,” Sam said into my ear. The wind almost carried his words away, but I heard them.

I leaned back to look at Sam, our arms still around each other, and I let out a sad, desperate laugh. “What would I even say? Everything I did—pretending to be his girlfriend for money and the apartment—I agreed to it.” Sam looked like he was about to protest, so I amended: “Most of it.”

“What he did to you—with the IUD. It’s assault. And Wendy—what if he did something to her?”

My mouth fell open in alarm. “You think he did something to her?”

“That’s what you said.” He shook me by the shoulders. “We need to do something.”

“I don’t know—”

“You can’t talk to him again.”

“I know.”

“You can’t see him again. You know what you need to do.” Sam’s eyes were dark and wild. He was gripping me by the arms. “End it.”

I could only shake my head. “I tried,” I told him. “It didn’t work.”

I told Sam I needed to go back down to wait for Wendy. Sam wanted me to wait at his place, but I said no, it was too risky. Leo could be watching. “If he sees me at your place . . .” I let the sentence dangle.

“Let him watch,” Sam said. “What’s he going to do about it?”

Our voices echoed in the stairway, an industrial cement chamber that didn’t feel like it belonged to the quaint, old-fashioned architecture of the rest of the building. My body reacted to his words before my mind or mouth could catch up. It started to tremble. First my hands quivered. My legs followed, weak and boneless. My teeth chattered, too.

Sam had to hold me up. “I’m going to call a doctor.”

“I’m okay.” I breathed in and tried to steady myself. I offered him a reassuring smile. “Just jet-lagged is all. I haven’t slept in—I don’t know. Twenty hours or something.”

“Then you should get some sleep.”

“I need to find Wendy.”

“How about this.” Sam’s voice was measured. “I’ll go look for Wendy while you rest. Just close your eyes for a few minutes.”

“I should look for her. I’m the one who lost her.”

“But he’s tracking you, right? He’s following you?” We knew that for sure, Sam explained to me carefully. Leo could be following him, too, but we didn’t know that. So it made sense. It made sense for Sam to look for her. The best thing I could do was wait, in case she returned on her own. Right?

I thought it over. Then I nodded.

Sam exited the stairwell first, at my insistence.

For a few minutes, I waited. My heart was beating too quickly; I couldn’t catch my breath. Finally I did it—opened the stairwell door and stepped out. The Glasseye tracked my moves as I traversed the hall and entered my apartment. I could feel it, the way you can sense a person staring from across the room. I’d disabled my account, but it was tracking me anyway. Glasseyes followed everyone, I reminded myself, but if my account was disabled, it wouldn’t know who I was. It wouldn’t send notification to my watchers, my 10,540 watchers. Ten thousand, five hundred, thirty-nine strangers and Leo Glass.

At least, that was what they said. That was how it was supposed to work.

Wendy still wasn’t home. I hadn’t expected her to be, though I had hoped. In my bedroom, I opened my laptop and considered contacting her some other way—email, instant message, or something. He could be monitoring all of it. It was better not to risk it.

My body sank back onto my pillows. My own bed. I shed layers, the limp clothes I’d been wearing for too long, through airplanes and airports. Everything would be better if I could just get some sleep, if I could just think straight. Outside, the sky was darkening. It was almost night. I could close my eyes and rest, and when I woke up, I would know what to do.

Almost instantly I felt myself giving in, my body shutting down, my mind going dark and blank, and it was such a relief to be back home, to be back in my own bed. Everything was going to be better in the morning.