Memory Of The Shadows
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“You’re not going to believe this,” said the man. “I’m in a bar, and I just met someone who knows you.” He was sitting at one of the tables near the back wall; he had been drinking for some time before his friend arrived with him.
His face looked like it might have once belonged to an old-time movie star—a sharp nose that angled up into high cheekbones, large dark eyes set above full lips. But now there were lines around those eyes and mouth as if they’d never quite fit together properly.
And the hair on top of his head seemed almost white instead of black. It made him look older than he probably really was: forty or so years old, maybe more.
He leaned forward over the table toward me and spoke quickly. “This is crazy! You know what? This guy’s name is—”
“—Brennan?” I asked. My voice sounded strange to my own ears, but then again, everything did these days.
The man nodded eagerly. “That’s right!” He took another drink from his glass, which by now was mostly empty. Then he reached across the tabletop and grabbed hold of my hand. “It’s good to meet you finally,” he said. “I’ve heard all about your work. We need to talk sometime soon.”
But I didn’t say anything. Instead, I stood up slowly, trying not to make any sudden moves. There wasn’t much room between us at the table, but still, I felt afraid. As I moved away, I could feel him watching me out of the corner of his eye.
When I got outside, though, I stopped walking altogether. For a moment I just stood there staring down at the sidewalk beneath my feet. Behind me, I thought I heard something being dragged along behind me, but when I turned around I saw nothing. Just the streetlights and the cars passing by.
Then I walked off, heading straight home without looking back.
***
My apartment building was only two blocks away, but even after I crossed the intersection where the bars used to be, it still took me several minutes to reach its front door. By then, I knew exactly how far the shadows had come.
They weren’t moving anymore—not very fast anyway—but their presence was everywhere around me. In the air, in the walls themselves, underfoot. Everywhere except inside my body, where they couldn’t touch me directly unless I let them through somehow.
That’s why I always carried a knife with me whenever I left the house. Not because I ever expected to use it against anyone else, but simply so that I would have no choice but to kill myself if things went badly enough.
When I finally opened the door to my apartment, I found that my wife hadn’t yet returned from her trip to New York City. She must have gone shopping while she was there, since our fridge was filled with foodstuffs we both liked and none of which either of us particularly needed.
So I sat down on the couch and began eating cold pizza and drinking beer until she came home. Afterward, I lay down on the bed and fell asleep immediately.
In the morning, I woke up alone. A note beside my pillow read:
Sorry, honey. I’ll try to get back here tonight, but I can’t promise anything.
Love,
Lori
I spent most of the day lying on the sofa, reading books and magazines. At nightfall, I called Lori’s cell phone number and left a message asking her if she wanted to go out for dinner somewhere. No response. Finally, late in the evening, I decided to take a walk downtown and see if there was any sign of life anywhere.
As usual, the streets were deserted. All the stores were closed, and the restaurants and clubs were all shuttered tight. Even the sidewalks were completely devoid of people. Only the streetlamps remained lit, casting long shadows onto the pavement.
The buildings loomed tall and ominous overhead, each one seeming to extend its arms toward the sky, reaching out toward whatever was hidden behind the clouds. Everything smelled faintly of smoke, and the air itself felt heavy, oppressive. I passed a few homeless men sleeping in doorways, but otherwise, I saw nobody else.
Eventually, I ended up standing in front of the place where the bars used to be. Here and there I noticed small piles of rubble scattered among the weeds and trash. Some of the larger pieces bore signs that identified them as bricks and beams from the former establishments.
Others were just broken bits of wood and concrete. Standing there, I tried to imagine what it must have been like to live here during the last century when this entire neighborhood had bustled with activity every single night.
Now it looked as dead and abandoned as any other part of town. It made me wonder whether anything really changed at all, or if we’d merely become more aware of it. If anything, maybe we should have seen it coming all along. Maybe we’re just too stupid to realize what’s happening.
At least I’m smart enough to know better than to think about such things.
I kept walking, eventually winding up near the old train station. The tracks had already been torn up years ago, but the platform was still intact. From time to time, trains still ran past on their way north and south, although they never slowed down to stop.
And occasionally someone would step out into the middle of the track and wait for the next one to pass before stepping back again. But that was probably just some kind of game. Nobody actually did it on purpose.
After a while, I started feeling tired. My head ached, and my legs hurt. I leaned against the wall of the platform, closing my eyes and listening to the sound of the wind blowing through the trees above me.
“Hey, buddy,” a voice suddenly said. Startled, I jumped to my feet and spun around to find an elderly woman sitting on the bench nearby. “You look like you could use a little help.”
She wore a faded blue dress and a pair of thick-rimmed glasses. Her hair was white and thin, and her face was covered with wrinkles. As she smiled at me, I realized that she reminded me of my mother.
“Thanks,” I replied. Then I asked, “How do you know who I am?”
The woman laughed softly. “It doesn’t matter, does it? You don’t need to answer that question. Not anymore. We’ve got bigger problems now anyway. Let’s talk about those instead, okay?”
So I told her everything—about how I’d lost my job, about why I couldn’t afford to pay rent, about how Lori had left without saying goodbye. When I finished talking, the old lady nodded slowly.
“That’s terrible,” she said. “But it happens sometimes. People fall apart under pressure. They lose their grip on reality. That’s not unusual. In fact, it’s pretty much expected these days. Just keep your chin up, and things will work themselves out eventually. Don’t worry so much. Things always turn out fine in the end.”
Then she stood up and walked away, leaving me alone once more.
***
A couple of weeks later, I went back to the same bar. This time, though, I wasn’t looking for trouble. Instead, I simply wandered inside and ordered a drink. There weren’t many customers in the place, but everyone seemed friendly enough. Most of them were regulars, and they greeted me warmly.
One guy even bought me a beer. He introduced himself as Joe, and he claimed to be a retired cop. A lot of his friends worked for the city police department, but none of them ever bothered to come by and visit him. So when I showed up, everybody assumed I was another one of them.
Joe didn’t seem to mind. On the contrary, he insisted that I sit down and join them. Afterward, we talked for hours about our jobs, then politics, and finally religion. By the time I left, I knew almost everyone there. They invited me to stay longer, but I politely declined.
Besides, I needed to get home early tonight. I wanted to make sure Lori was all right.
When I arrived, however, I found that something was wrong. Our apartment was dark and quiet, and the doors were locked. I knocked several times, calling her name loudly until finally, she answered me. She came running downstairs, wearing only a bathrobe and slippers.
“Where have you been?!” she demanded angrily. “Why are you late?”
“Sorry,” I said quickly. “Something happened at work today. I forgot to set my alarm clock.”
Lori stared at me suspiciously. “What do you mean?”
“Nothing important,” I assured her.
We sat together on the couch, holding each other tightly. For a long time, neither of us spoke. Finally, Lori broke the silence by asking, “Can you tell me what’s going on?”
“I can try,” I replied. “They’re two sides to every story, after all.”
“Okay,” she agreed reluctantly. “Go ahead.”
“First of all, let me say this: I love you very much. I want nothing more than to spend the rest of my life with you. I’ll do anything you ask, no matter how difficult or painful it might be. All I care is that we both live happily ever after.”
“And yet…”
“Yes, I understand that you feel differently. But please…don’t leave me. Please don’t walk away from me again!”
Lori looked into my eyes and sighed deeply. Then she took my hand in hers and began to speak.
“Let’s start with the day before yesterday. It was Friday night, and we decided to go out dancing. We met some friends at a club downtown, and we stayed there till three o’clock in the morning. The music was loud, the drinks were strong, and the girls were hot.
At first, everything felt great, and I thought maybe we really did belong together. Maybe we should give it another chance.
“By the next afternoon, though, I started having second thoughts. I kept thinking about the way you treated me last week. About how you never called or wrote to me. And about how you’d disappeared without warning. Now I realize that I’m just being silly. Of course, you wouldn’t disappear on purpose.
Nobody would do such a thing unless they had good reason to believe it was necessary. Still, I guess I still hoped against the hope that you’d change your mind. I suppose I wanted to convince myself that you hadn’t meant to hurt me. That you were sorry for what you did. That you loved me too much to abandon me like that.
“Well, I was wrong. Because when I saw you at the club, it turned out that you didn’t look any different than usual. Nothing had changed between us since last Sunday. So naturally, I wondered if perhaps you were trying to fool me. If you’d somehow managed to forget what you’d done to me.
Or if you were planning to do it again. Either way, I couldn’t help feeling afraid. Afraid that you might hurt me badly someday, and then run off somewhere to hide forever. So instead of talking to you, I ran away. I told you to leave me alone, and I refused to see you anymore.”
She paused briefly. Then she continued speaking softly. “You know, I’ve tried hard to forgive you for hurting me. I even went so far as to apologize for not trusting you enough. But now I think it’s time I stopped making excuses. You made your decision. I won’t argue with you anymore.
I refuse to beg you to come back! No matter how many tears I shed, no matter how much pain I suffer, I will never take that step backward. There must be an end to this. One way or another, I need closure. Otherwise, I’ll always wonder whether you actually meant what you said. Whether you really cared about me. I can’t risk losing you again. Not ever!”
As Lori finished speaking, I reached over and held her close. Her words tore through my heart like knives. Tears streamed down her cheeks, and mine followed soon afterward.
After a while, Lori pulled herself free from my arms. She stood up and walked toward the bedroom. As she closed the door behind her, I heard her sobbing quietly. I listened carefully, hoping to hear her voice again. But I could make no sense of what she was saying.
I knew that I needed to find out exactly where things stood between us. Yet I couldn’t bring myself to follow her inside. Instead, I remained sitting on the sofa, staring blankly at the wall.
Finally, I got up and headed upstairs to bed. When I returned to our living room later that evening, Lori was gone. I searched everywhere but couldn’t locate her anywhere. Afterward, I spent hours searching online for news stories about missing persons. But I found nothing. Eventually, I gave up and fell asleep on the couch.
The following morning, I awoke early and drove straight to work. My mood was dark and gloomy. I wasn’t sure why, except that something bad had happened the previous night. Something terrible. I didn’t have any idea what it was, only that it involved Lori.
That afternoon, I received a call from Detective O’Hara. He asked me to meet him at his office immediately. When I arrived, he led me into a small conference room and offered me coffee. While we waited for it to brew, I explained what had occurred during the past few days. Then I told him about Lori’s disappearance.
“I assume you haven’t reported this to the police?”
“No,” I replied. “Why? Do you suspect foul play?”
O’Hara shook his head. “Not necessarily. It’s possible that she simply left town. I mean, if she was unhappy here, maybe she decided to move elsewhere. In fact, that seems more likely than anything else. But I want to talk to you anyway. Just in case.”
He sat across from me, sipping his own cup of coffee. His expression suggested that he already suspected who I was. Which probably meant that he also knew everything there was to know about me.
For several minutes, we talked casually. At one point, however, he became quiet and stared directly at me. Finally, he spoke.
“So…you’re married, right?”
“Yes.”
“And you live together with your wife…”
“Right.”
“…in a house near the beach.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Do you love your wife?”
My reply came quickly. “Of course I do.”
“Then why did you sleep with Lori?”
His question caught me by surprise. I hadn’t expected such an obvious line of inquiry. Still, I answered without hesitation.
“Because I loved her.”
“But you don’t anymore.”
“No.”
O’Hara nodded slowly. Then he took a sip of his coffee before continuing.
“Lori tells me that you met her at the club. And that you two started dating shortly after that.”
“That’s correct. We were friends first. Then lovers. That was three months ago. The day we met, she invited me home with her.”
“Did you visit her often?”
“Almost every weekend. Sometimes twice a week. Whenever I could get away from my job. Usually, late Friday nights, when everyone else was leaving the club.”
“What kind of relationship did you have?”
“It changed all the time. Some weeks we’d spend most of our time together. Other times, we wouldn’t see each other for days. But we always kept in touch. By phone, email, text messages—whatever method worked best. Whatever was easiest for both of us.”
“How long has she been missing?”
“Since last night.”
“When did you realize that something might be wrong?”
“About ten o’clock this morning. That’s when I went looking for her.”
“Where is she now?”
“I can’t say.”
“You said earlier that she moved here recently. How does someone go about doing that?”
“She rented a place in town. A condo. From some guy named Mark.”
“Mark?”
“Yeah. That’s what she called him.”
“Are you certain it was Mark?”
“There was never any doubt. They seemed very much in love.”
“Who owns the condo?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe they bought it as a joint investment. Or maybe it belonged to her father or mother.”
“Does anyone else know about this arrangement?”
“Only Lori and Mark.”
“Is there any chance that Lori would leave town on her own?”
“None whatsoever.”
O’Hara leaned back in his chair and studied me closely. For a moment, I thought he was going to ask another question. But instead, he just smiled slightly and looked away. After a minute, he returned his attention to me.
“Okay then,” he finally said. “Let’s begin again. Where did you meet Lori?”
“At the club.”
“Which club?”
“The Dunes.”
“Have you ever seen her dance there before?”
“No. She usually works for private parties.”
“Private parties?”
“Occasionally, she’ll take clients out to dinner or to their hotel rooms. If things are going well between them, sometimes she even stays overnight.”
“How many men has she slept with since you’ve known her?”
“A lot.”
“More than fifty?”
“Probably close to sixty.”
“Has she ever brought any of these guys home with her?”
“Never.”
“Ever?”
“Well…maybe once or twice.”
“To your house?”
“No. To a different apartment nearby.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing. As far as I know, nothing serious.”
“Was she happy?”
“Very.”
“Why didn’t she tell you about those other relationships? About how many people she had sex with?”
“I guess she wanted to keep it secret. Something she only shared with Mark.”
“How did you find out about them?”
“We talked about it. Once in a while. When we got drunk enough.”
“Were you upset?”
“Of course not! Why should I care about that stuff?”
“Did she ever mention having feelings for any of these guys?”
“Not really. Not like real love. Just lust.”
“Did she ever talk about marrying any of them?”
“Maybe once or twice. But she never meant it. It was just fun. Nothing more.”
“Did she ever discuss marriage with anyone else?”
“No. Never.”
“Did she seem unhappy?”
“Sometimes. Especially if things weren’t going so well with Mark.”
“Tell me about that.”
I hesitated briefly before answering.
“He’s a nice guy. Very attractive. He makes a good living. Works hard. Has lots of money. Owns several businesses. Everything she wants.”
“So why isn’t she married to him yet?”
“They’re still trying to work everything out. Things aren’t easy right now.”
“Do you think she loves him?”
“Yes.”
“And do you love her?”
For the second time, O’Hara paused for a few seconds. This time, however, he appeared to be thinking carefully rather than simply gathering his thoughts. Finally, after taking a deep breath, he spoke.
“Lori told me that you were seeing someone else at the same time she was dating Mark.”
“That’s true.”
“Who was this woman?”
“Her name is Lacey.”
“What’s she like?”
“Beautiful. Smart. Funny. And very sexy.”
“How long have you been involved with her?”
“Three months.”
“How often does she come over to your house?”
“Every day.”
“Would you describe yourself as deeply in love with her?”
“Absolutely.”
“But you don’t want to marry her?”
“I wouldn’t mind getting married someday. But not anytime soon.”
“In fact, you don’t see yourselves together forever?”
“No. Of course not!”
“Then why are you sleeping with each other?”
“Because I love her too.”
“Is there anything else you’d like to add?”
Before I could answer, the phone rang. O’Hara picked up the receiver and listened intently for a moment. Then he hung up without saying a word.
“You can go home now,” he said quietly.
***
When I arrived back at my place, Lacey greeted me with a big hug and kiss. We made love all night long. The next morning, when I woke up alone in bed, I realized that I hadn’t actually heard from Lori since our conversation two days earlier. I called her cell phone but couldn’t get an immediate response.
The End