David Ellis - The Last Alibi

Shauna watches me, almost clinically, like she’s observing me for an objective evaluation. Then, without warning, her eyes begin to fill. Her expression doesn’t change. If anything, it grows stonier. But those eyes always give her up.

“I’m pregnant,” she says.

Jason

Friday, July 26

I search Shauna’s face, uncertain I heard the words correctly, but surer every second, as the tears roll down her face, as she picks at a fingernail, her eyes casting downward.

“I’m pregnant,” she says, “and I’m terrified.”

“No. No.” I am out of my chair now, coming around my desk.

I approach her, and she weeps silently, the way she always does, her shoulders bobbing, and when she looks back up at me she has to blink away tears furiously, her mouth in a scowl.

Something clears inside me, not a sudden jolt but the slow rise of the sun, something long dormant waking up and rearing its head, stretching its limbs, clearing its throat, reasserting itself. Now I remember, I realize. Now I remember.

And it surges through me, shaking me so hard that the hand I raise to her cheek is trembling. I wipe at her tears with my thumb, pull her in close to me.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers.

“No. Don’t ever-”

And then my throat chokes up, and I press against her, and everything is different, because it has to be different, I want it to be different, I’ve wanted it to be different for so long now that I’ve forgotten what it felt like, what it looked like.

“I’m addicted to OxyContin,” I say. “I don’t know how I let it happen, but I did. I thought I could take as much of it as I wanted, as often as I wanted, because I was strong. But I’m not strong. Not strong enough. I. . I want to stop, Shauna. But I need help.”

“Then you will,” she whispers. “I’ll help you. We’ll do it together.”

I press my lips into her hair, run a hand over her back. “I promise you I’ll beat it,” I say, my voice gaining strength again. “I won’t let you down. Ever, Shauna. I won’t ever let you down again.”

She slowly draws back, puts her hands on each side of my face, looking at me. “I know you won’t,” she says.

Jason

Friday, July 26

Alexa opens the door to her home. Her smile disappears as soon as she sees the look on my face.

Things have been on a downward slide between us, a slow and steady decline. It’s the kind of thing that neither party to a relationship openly acknowledges, but each one recognizes. This visit, this moment, can’t be entirely a surprise to her. But there is so much that goes unsaid in a relationship that sometimes you don’t know until you do it.

“Something’s wrong,” she says to me, backing up, letting me into her home, but not taking her eyes off me, her facial expression telling me that she sees it coming.

“My life has been wrong for a while now,” I say. “I have to turn it around. I’m going to turn it around. Right now.”

“You’re. . pale,” she says, reaching for me, but I recoil. “Is it your knee?”

I resist the impulse to smile. “I think we both know my knee is fine, Alexa. I’ve become a drug addict. And if I don’t change that, I’m going to wind up in the gutter.”

“Okay, okay,” she says, coming to me again. “Let me help.”

I take her by the wrists, blocking those hands that caressed me so often. “You deserve better than this. I know that. But I have to start fresh. I have to end this between us right now. I’m very sorry, but that’s the way it has to be.”

She doesn’t take it well. She pulls back from me, shaking her head, breathless, wagging a finger like she’s warning me, no no no . She doesn’t speak. It’s as if the wind has been stolen from her. Like a child gearing up for a loud cry.

“Are you going to be okay?” I ask, trying to strike the proper balance between concern and dispassion. I need to keep some distance now. It won’t make it any easier for her if I touch her, soothe her, take her in my arms one last time.

“Am I. . going. . am I. .” She staggers into the living room, bracing herself against the love seat.

I consider all sorts of platitudes. It’s for the best. I think you’re great. You’re going to find someone special. It’s just not the right time. Empty words, all of them. Words to ease the discomfort of the deliverer of the bad news more than the recipient. She is suffering now, and my feelings for her were genuine, too, at least on some level. But I can’t separate our relationship from the pills. I’m not sure there was a relationship without those pills. So I’m not going to coddle her with some mouth candy that I think I’m supposed to utter. I’m not going to pretend that this is going to feel better for her tomorrow.

She has made it to the couch, where she sits. I fetch a glass of water, not that she requested it, and place it on the table next to her. She is trying to breathe.

“Alexa, I’m worried about your safety,” I say. “With this killer out here who has a hard-on for me. Can I. . Would you let me buy you a plane ticket somewhere? Anywhere. You name it. I can put you up in a hotel somewhere where you’re far away-”

“Oh, wouldn’t that be convenient,” she spits. “You dump me, then ship me off to another state.”

“I’m serious, Alexa. When we were together all the time, I didn’t worry about you. But now. .”

She raises her eyebrows.

“I don’t want anything to happen to you, and I can’t protect you except to get you out of town for a while. Just until we figure out who this guy-”

“I’m not a charity case. I don’t want a plane ticket. I want you .” She looks up at me.

I open my hands. “I can’t give you that. I have to start over. I’m sorry.”

“I thought you loved me,” she whispers.

I squat down. “Alexa, I haven’t been right in the head. It’s not fair to you, but it’s true. Of course I have feelings for you, but when you’re addicted to drugs, that becomes your love affair. I know it’s hard to understand.”

Actually, I think she understands it quite well. Shauna, I think, had it right about her. She liked that I needed help, that I was struggling, that I needed her . Amazing, really, what a wake-up call can do for your sense of reality. The truth is that Alexa was a part of my spiral, she was enabling the spiral.

“I’m going to get help,” I say. “And I’m going to move on. And I hope you can move on, too.”

She hiccups a laugh. Something has risen inside her and reached her eyes, turning them hard. “You’ll be back. I’m the best thing that ever happened to you.”

I draw back, surprised at the abrupt change. But there’s no handbook for this kind of thing.

“I have to leave,” I say. “I’m going to leave now. Take care of yourself, Alexa.”

I stand and try to think of something appropriate to do or say. Failing that, I head for the door.

“Who’s going to be your alibi?” she says, regaining some composure now, standing at the couch. “Who’s going to keep you out of prison?”

I flap my arms. “You were never my alibi,” I say. Then I turn and leave.

Shauna

Friday, July 26

The Arangold victory party starts at lunch on Friday and continues onward. I couldn’t deny them or Bradley this moment, however little I feel like doing it myself. I manage to stay with the crew until a little before three o’clock, when I duck away. I catch a lot of grief for leaving, but at the end of the day everyone’s feeling very happy, and there’s only so much they’ll complain.