In the Season of Killing Bolts

Chapter 17

The only thing he knew for certain was: he wanted to be with her—with Amal—his wife. And if that meant suffering the same fate, well, he’d decided he was prepared for that. Decided it as he unbarred the exit and walked unprotected into the Sonoran Desert. Reconfirmed it as he gained State Route 87 and began heading west, heading back. Toward the crushed Toyota Camry and the blood on its door. Toward the last place he had ever seen his wife alive.

For it was over, this much he knew; and if he hadn’t known it before, the slaughter of the Secret Service agents and Troopers had surely convinced him. The world, such as it was, for he’d never been an optimist, had—how had Stephen King put it?—moved on. He knew this just as sure as he knew he had no interest in living without Amal—much less as an old man who could barely walk; who’s back ached with each step and who’s lungs felt papery and thin; and who’s eyes were failing not just rapidly but exponentially—who couldn’t even hear!

No. No, he would drink of her presence (or the ghost of it) one last time in the crushed car at the side of the road—the car they had bought as a wedding present to themselves in 1997 and in which they’d made love as twenty-year-old elopers and which had always run like a dream no matter what because it was a Toyota and that used to mean something—and then dash the cup to the ground; having no more answers—to Life, to where the socks went in the f*****g dryer, to this, this flashback—than he’d had as a boy in Tacoma, Washington—and not caring. For he wanted to see his wife again—that was really the long and the short of it. And maybe, just maybe, there was a place where he could still do that. At which point a shadow fell over him and something snorted in the rain (which was lessening) and he looked up—to see the same animal that had killed his wife looming high above (for its markings were distinct: a U-shape above its eyes and two black circles, like a cobra). —and he smiled. Because he knew they’d be together soon.

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