PART TEN THE RECKONING
They sat with it. Neither of them moved for a while.
Devin was crying now, quietly, with the hard control of someone who had never let himself. He said: I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’ll delete all of it. I’ll never do it again. I’ll tell everyone. Please. Please don’t.
Caleb was not listening to the words. He was doing math in his head.
The math of a man who has just shot the wrong person.
He had driven to Albuquerque on the word of a liar.
He had aimed his rage at a woman with two babies because he could not stand the idea that the love of his life was a fiction.
He had not been able to face the truth when Wyatt gave it to him.
He had chosen the version that let him keep the woman, the version that let him be a man wronged by a woman instead of a man fooled by a man. And a woman was dying because of it.
He thought: my life is over.
He thought: if they catch me, it’s over. The rental car. The card. The gun from Trey’s garage. The boutique. The coworker. The camera in the parking lot. The shell casings in the driveway. The highway. The tolls. It was all there, a trail a first-year detective could follow.
He thought: I can’t go home.
He thought: I have to hide. I have to leave the car. I have to wait. I have to find out if she lives. I have to find out if they are looking for me.
He studied Devin. And he understood the last thing, the final truth.
The person who was going to help him hide was the person sitting across the table from him.
The person who had made him. The person who had built the lie that had sent him to Albuquerque.
The person whose voice he loved. The catfish.
The only other person in the world who knew the whole truth, because the whole truth was that they had made each other.
Caleb had made a monster out of his need to be loved.
Devin had made a monster out of his need to hurt.
And the two monsters were sitting across a small table from each other in a dark apartment full of action figures, and one of them had a gun.
Caleb watched Devin. He saw that Devin understood it too. He saw the recognition cross Devin’s face. Devin understood that he was not getting out of this room. That the man across from him was not leaving. That the man across from him had nowhere else to go.
Caleb said: you’re going to help me.
Devin said: what?
Caleb said: you’re going to help me. I can’t go home.
I can’t take the car back. I have to stay here.
I have to wait. And you’re going to help me.
Because you did this. You made me. You sent me there.
You gave me the city. You gave me the photos.
You did this to her and you did this to me. And you’re the only person who knows.
Devin said: I’ll do whatever you want. Just put it down. Please.
Caleb did not put it down. He said: we’re going to stay here.
Both of us. For a while. You’re going to delete the profiles.
You’re going to close the accounts. You’re going to be here when I need you to be here.
And if anyone comes to the door, you’re going to tell them I’m your roommate.
You understand? You’re going to do what I say.
Because I have this. And because you owe me.
And because I’m not taking no for an answer.
You of all people understand that. You never took no for an answer either.
Devin stared at him. He understood that he was being kidnapped by his own mark.
He understood that the man he had made was now the man who would own him.
He understood that the apartment he had lived in alone for three years, the apartment where he had broken countless hearts and lives, was now a cage, and he was in it with the one life that had broken back.
He thought: she might live. She might make it. And if she does, they will come looking. And if she doesn’t, they will come looking. Either way they come looking. And I am in here with him.
Caleb saw him think it. Caleb said: don’t.
Don’t think about the door. Think about this.
We’re here. We’re both here. We’ve been talking for four months.
We’ve been in love for four months. You told me you loved me.
You told me about the future. You sent me pictures.
You called me. You checked on me. You asked how my day was.
Devin said: that wasn’t real.
Caleb said: it was real to me. It was the realest thing I ever had. And now you’re here. And I’m here. And the woman in the photos is in a hospital because of us. Because of you and because of me. We did that together. You and me.
The gun stayed on the table between them. Neither of them moved to put it away.
Caleb’s gaze moved around the apartment. The action figures on the shelf. The posters. The consoles. The small table and the two chairs. Then Devin.
He said: we’re going to get to know each other.
For real this time. No profiles. No photos.
Just us. You’re going to tell me your real name.
I’m going to tell you mine. We’re going to figure out what to do about the car.
About the gun. About what happens next. And you’re going to be here.
Because you don’t have a choice. And because I have this.
And because, after everything, after all of it, after the four months and the phone calls and the good mornings and the good nights and the I love yous.
He paused. He gazed at Devin as a man gazes at the person he has decided is his.
Somewhere in Albuquerque, a woman was fighting for her life in a hospital bed, and neither of the men in this room knew yet whether she would see morning.
Two babies were sleeping without their mother.
And in a dark apartment in Denton, two lonely young men who had never been monsters, only lonely, sat across a small table from each other, one holding a gun, the other held by it, both sealed inside the lie they had built together.
Devin had needed help he never asked for.
Caleb had needed truth he refused to take.
Loneliness, untreated, will build you a monster out of whatever is closest. It had built two of them in this room, and the room was locked now, and the key was gone.
Love is not a game. Treat it like one and you learn the rule nobody prints on the box: you get exactly what you pay for, and oftentimes far more than you would expect.
Caleb said: after all, we’re in love, aren’t we.
- THE END -