“No…What about the people you don’t fall in love with? Do you go through with it on them?”
He doesn’t answer me. He turns the music up, leaving me alone to a mess of my thoughts for longer than I can bear.
Another several hours later
The Sonoran Desert stretches ahead of us for miles, and I realize that we’re nearing the border of Mexico. The sun has yet to rise over the horizon, and the early morning clouds hang low.
We’ve been driving in silence for hours—occasionally stopping for drinks and stretches, bits of “Are you okay?” here or there.
His hand has clasped mine several times, the mere touch of his fingers making me feel a bit more secure with ease. He says the words, “It’ll all make sense in the end,” under his breath, ever so often, but I don’t ask him what that means.
“You know, if your ultimate plan was to save me from my father, and run away together to start new lives, I would’ve been fine with that. All you had to do was tell me that in advance,” I said, trying to start a conversation. “The kidnapping was a bit unnecessary.”
He doesn’t answer. He just stares straight ahead.
He pulls the car over into the parking lot of a small bed and breakfast. He steps out and he motions for me to follow suit.
“It’s time for you to check in.” He pops the trunk and grabs a bag. “Make sure to request a room with a good view.”
He doesn’t grab a bag for himself. There isn’t one for him anymore.
“Aren’t you coming?” I ask.
“Does it look like I’m coming?”
I look down at the bag he hands to me and realize that this isn’t the bag I packed.
This new bag is stuffed with hair dye—strawberry blond, sweaters and hoodies, a disposable camera (Who still uses those?), and toiletries. There are envelopes and money inside, but my journal and personal mementos—things I actually wanted, are nowhere to be found.
“Where is the bag of my real stuff?” I look at him. “The stuff you insisted that I pack?”
“I saw what was in it,” he said. “You won’t need any of that for where you’re going.”
“So, what was the point of you making me pack it?”
“To see if you were willing to trust me again.” His voice is deadpan, and the warmth that was in his eyes earlier is long gone.
I stare at him for several minutes, each moment of silence marking a realization that I’m just now getting to see.
“This is what you were planning to do the whole time, isn’t it?” my voice is hoarse. “This is your idea of saving me from ruin and being my so-called hero?”
“I never told you that I was a fucking hero.” He sounds offended. “I have eight more things to handle, and I would’ve been finished with them by now, if you weren’t in my way. I can’t afford to let you be a burden to me anymore.”
“I’m a burden?”
“I didn’t stutter.” He pulls a wad of bills from his pocket and stuffs them into my jacket. “I have more important things to do than deal with a romance that’ll never work out right now. I’ll handle the divorce and make sure you have access to an account that’ll never run dry.”
“You’re leaving me in Mexico?” I narrow my eyes at him.
“This isn’t twenty-one questions, Meredith,” he says. “You need to listen very carefully, and you need to follow every direction to the letter.”
“Or else what?”
“I’m not going to answer that.”
“Michael—”
“Meredith.” He cuts me off. “Stop fucking talking, and just do what the hell I’m telling you to do. Now.”
He presses his finger against my lips before I can say another word. “If you don’t, you’ll die, and you’ll have wasted my fucking time.” He glares at me. “Eight o’clock check out. Cab to Naco. Pay in cash and show the Harriet passport. Check into the Rio Grande Hotel, and tell them you’re meeting someone named Benny. There won’t be a Benny, but at noon, you’ll need to swim across the lazy Azul river to avoid the number of protestors that are going to storm the city that day. Traffic will be at a standstill all week, so this is the best way. You’ve been doing one hundred laps a day for weeks, so you should be able to make that swim easily by now…”
I stare at him in utter disbelief.
“When you get there, you’ll tell them your name is Anna,” he says. “You’re a tourist who got lost, and you’d like to visit your security box. It’ll have everything you need. Transportation, more directions, currency, everything. And then four days from now, you’ll need to get to the airport and check in for an eight o’clock flight to Geneva, Switzerland. The receipt for the first-class ticket is already in your bag. The second you get there, you can start over living happily ever after.”
I shake my head, feeling tears fall down my face.
He repeats his instructions, three more times—each time more painful than the last. When he finishes, he has the audacity to ask me if I have any questions.
“Fuck you, Michael.” I step back. “Fuck you.”
“I never told you that this would be a fairytale,” he says. “I told you on the night we met that we couldn’t go any further. It’s your fault for getting your goddamn hopes up.”
“I thought you said that you wanted me to trust you.”
“You should trust me,” he says. “I just helped you get a whole new goddamn life. You can’t go back to New York, and you damn sure can’t live in the United States,” he says. “You can make something of yourself overseas, though. You once said that you could live anywhere and do fashion, so now’s the chance to see if you’re right.”
“Michael, please tell me that this is some type of sick joke. What about us? All the things you said about restarting what we had?”
“This is the end of us, Meredith.” He shrugs. “I said all of those things because at one point I thought I could mean them. Now, I’ve realized that I don’t, and I think that’s for the best.”
I don’t respond. I just let my mind remind me just how big of a fool I am for ever trusting this man.
“I need you to listen very carefully to this final list of directions I’m about to give you.” He starts talking again. “I wrote you this letter explaining the first part of everything I’ve done in detail. Should you take my advice and arrive at all the locations on time, a second letter will arrive explaining the rest.”
I take the letter from his hands and rip it in half. Then into smaller shreds, again and again.
“You’re going to regret that, Meredith.”
“The only thing I regret is falling in love with you.”
“So, you don’t enjoy living?” he hissed. “Because that’s far more important than some relationship. I’ve just ensured that you’ll get to keep doing that. You can say, ‘Thank you’ at any given time.”
I stand still, shocked to my core. First the news of my father, and now this. His way of ensuring I have a new life doesn’t sound like “living” at all.