Ren clears her throat.  “You guys.  If I ask to borrow whatever money you have, would you give it to me?  I don’t know when I’ll be able to pay it back.”

The girls do not say a word.  They search briefly through their belongings and deliver every bit of cash they find.  The gesture, just a small favor between sisters, means the world right now.

“Thank you,” she whispers and leaves them, praying for a few minutes of quiet so she can find Oscar, so she can make him understand what needs to happen now.

But there is no such thing as quiet.  There is her mother charging from August’s study, her father’s tired protests, her sisters’ confused whispers.

Ren flings open the front door and her first deep breath is full of smoke and dust.   The rumbling approach of thunder, the crack of nearby lightning, and the sight of Oscar Savage all collide.  Every nerve in Ren’s body begs her not to descend those stairs and face them.  Not because there is anything terrible waiting.  But because she will make it all terrible herself.

“Hey,” Oscar calls above the wind, waving from where he’d been lingering by the old hitching post, likely waiting for her.  Ren stops and merely watches as he hurries over. She forces her body to be rigid when he tries to take her hand.

Oscar frowns.  “What is it?”

I can’t.  I can’t.  I can’t.

“Don’t touch me.”

“Ren, what the hell is wrong?”

“You are.”

“Baby, what are you talking about?”

She feels a slow tremor as it begins in her heart and spreads everywhere.   She clenches her fists at her side.  It’s the only way she can avoid throwing her arms around his neck.

“I know,” she says quietly.

“You know what?”

Ren forces herself to look into his face.  He’s full of confusion, concern.  She’ll break his heart.  She’ll break hers too.  “I know all about you, Oscar.  All about you and Lita.”

Immediately he lets out a snort of laughter.  Of course.  Because it’s absurd.  He won’t believe she’s serious.  She has to make him believe. She takes a step back and looks at him with loathing.

“I know you fucked my mother and then moved on to me.  It’s disgusting.  You’re disgusting!”

“Are you crazy?  If this is a sick joke it isn’t funny, Ren.”

She remembers Lita’s words, hears her cold voice repeating terrible things that are a lie.  “You are the sort of trash who’s only looking for the next hole to satisfy yourself.”

“Loren.”

“You got what you wanted.  Now you need to go.”

“This is bullshit! I don’t know what the hell this is really about but I’m not going anywhere.”

“Yes, you will.  You have to.”  She pushes the wad of bills against his chest.  “Here.”

He stares down at the money. “What the fuck is this?”

“It’s not much, but I’m sure my father will give you more if that’s what it takes.”

Oscar grabs her by both wrists just as a cannon of thunder explodes overhead.   “You don’t fool me,” he whispers, his breath hot on her neck.  “I know this is not you talking.”

She almost wavers.  She closes her eyes and nearly tips forward right into his arms, knowing if she does she won’t have the will to ever leave them again.  Rain begins to fall; slow, fat drops.  When she opens her eyes the scene is full of people.  It’s no longer just her and Oscar.

As of right now there can’t be any more Loren and Oscar.

Monty has chosen this moment to return.   He parks the truck less than ten yards off and doesn’t cut the headlights, perhaps just stunned and perplexed by the sight of everyone hanging around in the muddy yard.  The harsh yellow light of the beams let Ren see everything, more than she wants to see.  Spencer stands about ten feet away, two shotguns slung over his shoulder.  Brigitte and Ava have emerged from the house, wide-eyed with bewilderment, sharing the shelter of a pashmina scarf to keep the rain from their carefully teased hair.  Lita and August are not far behind, Lita trying to elbow her way closer to enjoy the chaos she has caused.

And Oscar…

Oscar who she loves more than she loves herself is wearing a mask of betrayal and anger.  She steps away from him, knowing there won’t be any forgiveness for what comes next.

“Go,” she whispers.

He shakes his head.  “No.”

“Go, Oscar!”

“You don’t mean it.”

“Yes I do.  We are finished. We are nothing. And you just…you need to leave me alone now!”

He doesn’t touch her again.  He leans in close and speaks in a low voice that only she can hear over the wind and thunder.  “Then you better goddamn well say it.  Tell me you don’t want me.  Ren, you tell me that and I swear to god you’ll never fucking see me again.”

She pulls back.  “I don’t want you, Oscar.  I don’t want you.  I DON’T WANT YOU!”

A bolt of lightning.  A sonic boom of thunder.  One final glimpse of his devastated face before she turns and walks deliberately away.

The first person in her path is Spencer.  She gives her brother a beseeching look and silently begs him to understand when she whispers, “Help him.”

Walking is difficult.  Almost as difficult as breathing.  Her mother, a malevolent wraith, and her father, a weary loser, say nothing as she passes them.

But then suddenly her sisters are there, on either side, supporting her.  She’s never leaned on them before in her life but now she’s so very grateful that they exist.  They bring her indoors, to the sanctuary of their shared bedroom and they fall in a pile on the nearest mattress.  Ren doesn’t even know whose bed it is.  All she knows are the soundless wails of anguish that shake her soul as she curls into a ball and shivers while her sisters hover, silently stroking her hair.  She hopes it’s not the same for Oscar, that he feels more anger than grief.

It’s the grief that’s unbearable.  Anger is easier.  Withdrawal is easier.   If anyone dares to ask her for an explanation she will never tell them.  At this point there is nothing to tell.  There is no repairing this.   The only way to endure, to survive, is to forget.

She closes her eyes, sees Oscar’s face, and then willfully banishes it.  As her chest heaves and her body is wracked with sobs, only one thought rolls through her mind, over and over.

A plea.  To herself, to Oscar, to an infinite and unsympathetic universe.

Forget me.  I’m sorry.  Forget me. 

CHAPTER TWENTY

OZ

I can’t seem to follow my own plans so I keep inventing new ones.   Two nights ago when I drove out of Atlantis, my agenda involved several days of wide open roads before landing in Glacier National Park.  I could picture myself hiking through the stunning scenery as clearly as if I was already there.  It would be clean, the air crisp.  It would look nothing like the desert.  There, in the Big Sky Country, I could salvage the peace of mind I’d lost the minute an oily California opportunist called for a man named Oscar Savage.

Somehow though I wind up in Flagstaff and decide the world might look a little more cheerful after some sleep.  My phone remains in my glove compartment and I haven’t touched it.  It makes my head hurt a little bit to think of how much it’ll be blowing the fuck up if I actually dare to turn it on.

There’s no reason for me to hang around in Flagstaff for an entire day but that’s exactly what I do.  Four hours get swallowed up in a black hole at a greasy café that serves good coffee and buzzes with the chatter of tourists en route to the Grand Canyon.  Even though I’ve seen the Grand Canyon before, there isn’t anything on earth quite like it so I abruptly decide that I ought to see it again.

On my way out of Flagstaff I stop to pick up some supplies.  It’s enough to camp out comfortably for at least a week although I don’t really have any sort of a timeline in mind right now.  No one on earth knows where I am.   As I follow a line of cars on US Route 180 I wonder if I should examine why I can’t seem to find my way out of the state of Arizona.