“I think I’m ready.” Laney had come up behind him, a handful of dresses draped over her arm.
Chamber music drifted from somewhere. The air bore traces of a hundred perfumes. Glass display cases caught the light and made it dance. He followed Laney, watching the graceful sway of her hips. He could have walked behind her all day, all night, all the rest of his life, considered himself a happy man.
A saleswoman counted their garments, opened two changing rooms for them, hovered long enough to make sure they went into separate ones. Daniel began to undress, pulling off his T-shirt and laying it on the bench. Sliding his pants down his legs. Stepping out of his shoes. Cognizant of every feeling: cool air on his chest, cotton moving across his thighs, the firm weave of the carpet under his socks.
He looked at himself in the mirror. The same way he had in a tiny shithole hotel in Maine not long ago, when he had stared, praying for recognition. When the man in the mirror had seemed a doppelganger, known and unknown at once. The face of a man who had lost everything, even himself. Who had tried to end his own life. Air-conditioning made him shiver. Just days ago he had wanted to die, to throw his life away. And now he was facing that again, and now his desire to live was at an almost cellular level.
People thought about their mortality all the time, made a late night exercise of it, a philosophical discussion. Tried to grasp the idea that someday they would cease to exist. And, worse, the most painful betrayal of alclass="underline" the world would continue.
But it was a very different thing to stare in the mirror and realize that the question wasn’t someday. It was right now, today, tonight.
Keep it together. She needs you. You have to believe you’re going to win.
You have to believe that at the end of the night, you will be holding a loaded gun—and Bennett will not.
Glanced at his watch. Five-twenty-nine. Daniel pulled the pants from the hanger and began to dress.
When he stepped out of the dressing room, an angel of cream and gold stood in front of the mirror. Laney wore silver sandals and a peach dress that looked like it had been cut just for her. It was backless but fell below the knee, and when she spun, the hem whirled out. She caught him catching her legs, and smiled.
“Wow.”
She popped a hip, put her hands at her sides. “You like?”
“Wow.”
“And you,” she said, “look like James Bond.”
“Connery?”
“Craig.”
He laughed. “You’re missing something.” From his pocket he took the necklace, stepped behind her. She lifted her hair so he could fasten the clasp.
They stood side by side in the mirror. The two of them staring into it, and the two of them staring out of it. Such a long time to wait. And such a short time to live.
“I’ve got an idea,” she said.
5
“Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
“Laney . . .”
“Turn left.”
“We don’t have time—”
“Park over there.”
“The beach?” After they’d paid, she’d led him out to the car,
tossed him the keys. Then she’d steadfastly refused to tell him anything beyond directions. But “over there” was a wide parking lot at the foot of broad expanse of sand; Manhattan Beach, he guessed, not that it much mattered. The western hundred yards of the whole coast was bright sand, one beach blending into the next. He pulled into a parking space. “Now what?”
Laney reached in the backseat for her purse, slung it over one bare shoulder—man, that dress—then opened the door. “Come on.”
His first instinct was frustration, the sense that this was a waste of time. Then he remembered how very little time they might have left, and he followed her.
She walked fast, designer sandals flashing on the pavement. The air smelled of salt and sun. The sky was all the colors of autumn. He caught up to her just as she reached the sidewalk fronting the beach.
“Now what?”
Laney bent one knee, reached down to undo the strap of her sandal, then repeated it with the other. What the hell. He unlaced his new shoes, pulled off his socks, and then joined her on the beach. It was cool beneath his feet, and good. He wriggled his toes, took in the sensation of sand moving between them. The world is so beautiful.
“Ready?”
“For what?”
She smiled. “Go!”
And then she was sprinting, hair whipping behind, the hem of her dress flapping, one hand up to hold her purse strap to her shoulder.
He leapt after her, a dress shoe in each hand, bare feet digging deep into the beach. Every planted step dug to the cooler sand beneath. The wind pressed against him, constant and sweet. His slacks tightened at his knees, the tie flipped over his shoulder like a tail, and there was something so ridiculous about running on the beach in a new thousand-dollar suit that he found himself laughing without a sound, that inner laugh that was a soul’s cry of joy, and he gave himself over to it, leaned into the run. The soles of her feet flashed, and the dress, backlit against the burning sky, clung to the curves of her hips. She looked over her shoulder, mouth wide, eyes sparkling, a moment straight out of an advertisement or a dream. Light like melted butter burnished the air, and the sound of his breathing, and the scruff-scruff of the fabric on his legs, and it was perfect, the rest of the world forgotten. Laney was angling for a faded lifeguard stand the color of seafoam, and he pushed harder, not to win but just because it felt so good to throw himself into this moment, to have nothing but this, to hold it full and complete and wondrous and yet fleeting as a drop of rain.
She beat him to it by a second or so, slapping the wood with one hand, then raising her arms high. “Victory!”
“Oh yeah?” He stepped forward, hoisted her up over his shoulder. She squirmed and laughed, hair whipping around his waist, hands beating on his back and thighs. Ten paces took him to the hard-packed sand and pewter lace of the surf.
“You’ll wreck your suit,” she warned.
“I don’t care.” He stepped into the water, the cold of it lovely shocking, running up over his feet, his shins, his knees. The fabric of his trousers swirled in the surf. “In you go.” He braced himself.
“No!” Her hands went from batting to grabbing, snatching handfuls of his clothing. “No.”
He laughed, then lowered her down gently, feet first. The next wave slapped at his calves, splashing around them. She shrieked and danced back, pulling him with her, until they were only ankle deep. Daniel put his arms around her and kissed her as the Pacific rolled in and out, endless.
Finally, she lay her head against him and spoke to his chest. “You know what this reminds me of?”