I'm not asking you to forgive me right now. I'm asking for 10 minutes. The video's backed up, I replied, to two places, in case that's something you're thinking about. Her expression shifted. That one landed somewhere real.
Nathan, she tried again. I'll be at the house Sunday night to get some things, I said. I'd appreciate it if you weren't there. She stared at me. Something behind her eyes was trying to find the version of this where it still came back from the edge, where there was still a seam to work.
She'd spent a long time being good at finding those seams, but there wasn't one here. She could see that now, I think, actually see it, and watching her understand that was quieter than I'd expected it to be. Not satisfying, exactly, just final. She sat down on the end of the bed and put her face in her hands. I went into the main room.
Amber was sitting on the couch with her elbows on her knees, staring at the floor the same way Brent had been. She didn't look up when I came through. I didn't say anything to her. Her situation with Rick was their business, not mine. She'd made her choices.
So had Holly. So had both men in those rooms. Everybody in that cabin had made a long series of choices and they were all going to live with them now. I wasn't responsible for sorting it out. I walked out the front door.
Dana was in the gravel lot, standing outside her car, phone to her ear. She turned when she heard the door and held up one finger. Give me a second and went back to the call. I heard her say, "Yes, I understand it's after hours." And then, "No, I need to speak to someone tonight." She had her keys in her other hand and she was calm in the way someone is calm when they've already made the decision and are just executing it now. Rick was in his car, engine off.
He was looking straight ahead through the windshield at the tree line. I walked past and he didn't turn his head. I got in my truck. I sat there for a minute in the dark. The cabin light was still on inside.
I could see it around the edge of the door I'd left open. Nobody had come out yet. Probably nobody knew what to do next in there and I found I didn't have any interest in waiting to see how they figured it out. I started the truck. Dana was still on the phone.
She gave me a small wave as I pulled past her in the gravel. I lifted two fingers off the steering wheel. Then I was on the access road, then the highway, then nothing but flat dark and my headlights and two hours back to a house I was going to have to figure out what to do with. I didn't turn the radio on. I didn't call anyone.