The case for returning to Chicago had become more persuasive, though it didn’t pass his notice that the word “nonprofit” was nowhere to be found in the letter.
“I traded in my SUV,” Bud had written. “Can you picture me driving a hybrid! Reuse recycle and all that shit. Please accept this offer. Ethos needs you.”
Ray sipped from his glass and remembered that it contained only water. The scotch had been such a constant in his life that it felt odd to drink anything else. He tucked Bud’s letter back into its envelope and placed it on the mantel instead of in the pile of kindling. There was another greeting card from his mother. The airmail stamp had been cancelled with a brown splotch of his own blood.
He spent the day drinking tea, of all things, and rereading the end of Nineteen Eighty-Four. Something felt different about the text this time. Something was different. It seemed too convenient to attribute the change to his near-death experience, but it was clear now that he had been so wrong about that book. He saw it now. The appendix to Nineteen Eighty-Four, the infamous and thorny essay “The Principles of Newspeak,” was in past tense. That meant it was set after the demise of the entire Oceania empire. The appendix hinted at a world after Big Brother.
Orwell was an optimist after all.
Flora was right.
The end of Nineteen Eighty-Four suggested that all the degraded conditions and noise pollution and invasions of privacy people put up with every single day — it could all eventually end. Even after the builders whitewashed over Flora’s graffiti, her message would remain there, hidden yet waiting to get read again some distant day after the current and all-too-real version of Big Brother disappeared.
He put Orwell down and reread the letter from Bud. The physical sensation of holding the check in his hand was not enough to convince Ray of its existence. He stayed up half the night considering his options.
When Molly showed up a few days later, his belongings were packed and Barnhill’s floors mopped clean. She had carried a picnic basket on her new bike, freshly arrived from a mail-order company in Oban, and let herself in without knocking. Ray was fully clothed this time. He sat in the kitchen sipping a cup of black tea.
“What happened to your face?”
He was clean-shaven, with a constellation of bloody toilet paper pieces orbiting his chin. His skin felt raw and taut. Exposed. “Your father is right about at least one thing,” he said. “You really are a little bitch.”
“I see now why he shot you. Anyway, I heard you were leaving.”
She knew where he was going. He hadn’t told anyone yet.
“Who else knows?”
“Everybody. Mind you, it wasn’t that difficult to figure out.”
“It’s funny how an attempted homicide can make you rethink your life.”
“Aren’t we being a bit melodramatic today?”
“Am I the only one who thinks getting shot is kind of a big deal?”
“I heard that the bullet only grazed you.”
“It was worse than that. Anyway, it’s more the intent that bothers me.”
Molly sat and helped herself to his plate of food. “How are you feeling otherwise?”
“The fever’s gone. But look.” He held his arm out and the coffee cup rattled in its saucer. “I have the shakes. It won’t stop.”
“Too much whisky last night?”
“Not enough. I haven’t had a drop since I got home. I’ve been shaking the entire time.”
“I hope you’re up for a walk. I’ve packed a picnic.”
“No way. I’m going to catch the ferry tomorrow and need to get some rest.”
“You are not going to spend your last day on Jura moping around this dreary house. There’s one more place I want you to see.”
“What is it?”
“I said I want you to see it, not hear about it. Jesus.” She ran upstairs to check on her easels and collect the few clothes she had left behind, which she carried back down in a bundle and stacked in the sitting room. “It appears that something is missing.”
“I should’ve asked. Is that going to be a problem?”
“Pack your raincoat and a blanket so we can sit without being eaten alive.”
Another unidentifiable dead animal lay prostrate on the steps. It was enormous — the size of a deer. They stepped over it. The sky was bright and the air sharp in his lungs. A bank of clouds in the distance promised a shower. The two of them walked westward or maybe northwestward at half their usual pace in deference to his wound. It felt more like a leisurely stroll than their typical forced march. The clouds moved in and an advance party of raindrops persuaded them to put their coats on and quicken the pace. It fell in sheets by the time they got to the cliff that overlooked the water and the island of Colonsay. “We never get to see the sunset from here,” Molly said with some disappointment. The storm sat swollen in the sky between them and the sun. “Mind you, I have another idea. Follow me,” she yelled over the sound of the rain and the surf.
Molly found a switchbacking path that led down the cliff and to the beach below. The descent was treacherous with mud and slick rocks. She moved as gracefully as a mountain lion and waited for him at the bottom, then took his hand and led him on farther. A lamb had spilled from the cliff and lay mangled on the ground, where it fed a murder undaunted by their presence. A crow popped out one of the animal’s white eyes and flew off pursued by his friends.
“Here we are,” Molly said. She pointed to the opening of a cave and ran inside. He shuffled after her. The cave smelled of rain and freshly mown hay. Spray-painted graffiti covered the walls and the small fire pit contained some charred beer cans. Molly pulled the blanket from his pack and spread it on the ground at the opening, just beyond the range of the dripping water. He sat with some difficulty. Molly curled up next to him for warmth and pulled one end of the blanket over the two of them.
Even with the ache in his side, Ray felt satisfied now: neither sad to leave Jura nor eager to return to Illinois. He enjoyed the quiet moment in Molly’s company and looked forward with equal parts anticipation and dread to whatever his life would present him with next. “It has occurred to me,” he said, “that I no longer have an email address or even a phone number, but once I get settled I’ll send you my contact info. I can look around for apartments, unless you want to live in the campus housing, which I don’t recommend. You’re going to love Chicago. I mean, it’ll be a little overwhelming at first, but you’ll—”
“I’m not going.”
“—find that. What?”
“Don’t be mad.”
“What do you mean you’re not going?”
“I’ve decided to stay on Jura.”
“Because of your father? You can’t listen to him! You need to decide for yourself.”
“Aye, he was against it, but this is my decision and mine only.”
“What are you going to do? Spend the rest of your life here?” He didn’t like the tone of his voice but didn’t know how to modulate it without sounding like even more of an asshole.
“Maybe I will, mind you. This is my home after all. I want to be a painter … no, I’m already a painter. No fancy university can make me get better at my art the way the sunlight and the sounds and the Paps will. I appreciate everything, Ray, I really do! But I belong here, at least for now.”