Innocent

CHAPTER 44

Anna, August 5-6, 2009

You won't believe this," Nat tells me first thing when I pick up my cell in my office. He repeats the words. Each time I think Nat and I have crashed the last wave, that it cannot get any crazier, that we are finally on the downslide toward a regular life, something else comes up. "I just got off the phone with Sandy. They're letting my father out. Can you believe this? They're dismissing the charges."

"Oh, Nat."

"Can you believe this? Apparently Molto found out from the evidence tech that the computer wasn't secured the night before I turned it on. So there's no chain of evidence, and without a good chain there's no provable offense."

"I don't understand."

"I don't either. Not really. Neither does Sandy. But Yee already entered the order. Sandy still hasn't reached my father, because guys in seg can't get unscheduled phone calls. How's that for catch-22? Stern is waiting for the warden to call him back." A second later, Nat's phone beeps with an incoming call, and he lets me go so he can talk to Marta.

I sit in my little office, looking at the picture of Nat on my desk, full of relief for him, with joy for his joy. And even then, there is a cold corner on my heart. Although I would never wish it this way, the ugly truth is that for me it has been easier to have Rusty gone, to have no more of those confused moments when we have been together, with the signals jammed on both sides by mutual will and each of us seemingly counting the seconds until we can get away. Since Barbara died, we have said next to nothing to one another and have barely even lifted our eyes in each other's direction. The only real exception came in that moment right after his guilty plea, when Rusty turned and saw with clear surprise that I was seated beside Nat in the courtroom. "Complex" is not word enough for that look. Longing. Disapproval. Incomprehension. Everything he has probably ever felt about me was contained there. Then he turned away and held his hands behind himself.

I sit at my desk for the next forty minutes and do absolutely nothing except wait for the phone to ring again. When it does, the Sterns have finally come up with a plan. Rusty will be released from the state work farm at Morrisroe at three a.m. The timing is Sandy's idea. He is unsure whether word of Rusty's departure will leak, but he is confident that these days none of the news organizations can easily afford the overtime involved in sending out reporters and photographers in the middle of the night.

"Can you come with?" Nat asks me.

"Isn't this a time for just your dad and you?"

"No," he says. "Marta and Sandy are going to be there. We're the only family my dad has now. You should come, too."

It is a long night waiting to leave. The glum, visibly withdrawn man I have lived with for close to a year now is gone, at least for a while. Nat cannot sit down. He walks circles around the condo, checks the Web for the latest commentary about his father, and turns on the TV to read the crawl on the all-news cable stations. Apparently, a cadre of reporters arrived downstate to catch footage of Judge Yee leaving his chambers at five thirty p.m. today. He said nothing but smiled and waved at the cameras, amused as always by the amazing turns in life and thus the law. The reporters all use the word "stunning" to describe today's events. Stern has released a statement that the reporters read verbatim, praising the integrity of the prosecuting attorney and saying Sandy expects his client to be released tomorrow.

Around nine p.m., I suggest to Nat that we go out to grab some groceries for his father. It makes a good diversion, since Nat takes pleasure in gathering the things he knows his dad likes. Back home, we decide to go to bed-something good will happen there, a nap, at least-and we actually have to scramble to reach the Sabich family house in Nearing on time at one a.m., where we have agreed to meet to be sure there is not a press vigil already. Assuming all goes well at the institution, Rusty should be back here by four a.m. and will depart at once, before the press horde stakes out the place, for the family cabin in Skageon. It seems bizarre that a man would emerge from seg and choose to spend more time alone, but according to Stern, Rusty pointed out that being able to go down to town to buy a paper or watch a movie will make all the difference.

The Sterns arrive a few minutes after us in Marta's Navigator. Marta and Nat embrace at length in the driveway. When he releases her, he goes to the passenger side, where he leans in to hug Stern, more briefly. I met both of the Sterns a few months ago, when they were preparing for the trial, but Nat reintroduces me. I shake hands with Sandy. Under the dome light, he looks far more robust than the last time I saw him in court. The startling rash that covered a large part of his face is nothing but a faint blotch, and he has lost the starved, hollow look of a prisoner of war. It is not clear to Nat, or perhaps even to Sandy, whether this recovery is only a brief reprieve or something more lasting. For whatever significance it may hold, he does remark, as he is apologizing for not standing to greet me, that he is going to do something about "this damnable knee" as soon as he can face the hospital again.

On the ride, Nat peppers Sandy with questions about his father's future. Will Rusty get his pension? Can he go back on the bench? Nat alone seems unable to recognize what is patent to everybody else in the car, that Rusty's release on these terms, the ultimate in technicalities, will only go to make him more of a pariah. Since the DNA results became public in late June, the media talkers have often painted Rusty as a vicious schemer who committed two murders and manipulated a system he knew intimately to escape with minimal punishment. Now they will howl that he has escaped with no punishment at all.

Stern, however, is patient with Nat, explaining that his father will regain his pension, but that his status on the bench is far more complicated.

"The conviction is void, Nat, and since your father was automatically removed from office when he pleaded guilty, he will be reinstated. But Rusty admitted in open court that he obstructed justice, and he can hardly take that back. Not to mention everything he acknowledged at trial-improperly disclosing a decision of his court to Mr. Harnason, engaging in ex parte contact. The Courts Commission would be hard-pressed to ignore all of that. So they are bound to try to remove him.

"Overall, Nat, subject to your father's wishes, I would regard it as a very satisfactory outcome if we can barter your father's hasty resignation from the bench for an agreement that Bar Admissions and Discipline will take no action-or very limited action-against him. I would like to make sure that he will be able to return to practicing law eventually." For a second, the difficulties of Rusty's future, with no job, few friends, and next to nothing in the way of public respect, confound all of us and bring silence to the car.

We are at the institution nearly an hour early and spend time in an all-night truck stop, coffeeing ourselves to stay awake and lingering over the pictures of Marta's kids that she has stored on her phone. Finally, at two forty-five, we drive through the tiny town to approach the institution. The work farm stands on the formerly empty portion of the grounds of the state's lone maximum-security prison for women. The camp itself is a series of Quonset-like barracks and a central administration building of brick, where Rusty is housed on the top floor. The only substantial structure, it is surrounded by barns and two vast fields full of ripe beans and corn plants, which are high enough in August to look like graceful figures when their leaves bob on the breeze. Although the camp is a minimum-security facility, the neighboring institution requires a chain-link fence topped in whorls of razor wire and, within, brick walls nearly twenty feet high, with guard towers rising every couple hundred yards.

To further confuse the press, Stern and the warden agreed that Rusty will be released through the transport gate on the west side of the institution, where inmates are bused in and out. We park there in the gravel drive, outside the massive steel doors.

A few minutes before three, we hear voices in the still night, and then, without ceremony, one of the huge doors squeals and parts no more than a yard. Rusty Sabich steps into the beam of Marta's headlights, shielding his eyes with a manila envelope. He is wearing the same blue suit he had on when he was sentenced, with no tie, and his hair has grown amazingly long, more of a surprise to me than the whitish beard Nat has described after his visits. He is also quite a bit thinner. Nat and he walk toward each other and finally fall into each other's arms. Although we all stand at least twenty feet away, in the still night, you can hear the sounds of both men weeping.

Finally, they break apart, dabbing their eyes, and walk arm in arm toward the rest of us. Stern has used his cane to come to his feet, and Rusty embraces both his lawyers at length, then gives me a quick hug. In the drama of the moment, I have not noticed that another car has pulled up behind us, and I am briefly alarmed until Sandy explains that this is a photographer, Felix Lugon, formerly of the Trib, whom Stern notified. He wanted a picture for his walls, he says, but will also be able to use the photo as a way to bargain for a page-one story spinning Rusty's side of things in the next couple of days, if that proves advisable. The Sterns and Nat and Rusty link arms and pose for a couple of shots, then Lugon snaps away as Rusty gets into the front seat of Marta's SUV. Marta has already triggered the ignition when another figure emerges from the gate and trots toward us. It turns out to be a guard in uniform. Rusty opens the window and shakes hands with him, jabbering in Spanish, then after a final wave, the window is raised and we drive off through the heavy dust that Lugon's car raised, finally on the way to bring Rusty Sabich home.

The trip back always seems faster. Marta cruises along at more than eighty, eager to get Rusty on his way. After seeing Rusty, Sandy has scotched the idea of publishing his photo. Rusty's appearance is so different that he will have virtual anonymity, assuming we can avoid the press outside his house.

The former prisoner is quiet for some time, watching the landscape whiz past from the passenger's seat and grunting faintly now and then, as if to say, Oh, yes, I forgot open space, what it looks and feels like. He unseals the envelope he was carrying, which contains his belongings. He takes all the cards out of his wallet and looks them over one by one, as if to remind himself what they are for. And he seems inexpressibly delighted to find that his cell phone still works, although it blinks out after a second, in need of a charge.

"Can you explain this to me?" Rusty finally says when we have been on the road some time.

"Explain what?" asks Stern, to whom the question was directed, from the backseat.

"Why Tommy did this."

"I've already told you what he said, Rusty. The computer was not secured the night before it was turned on in court. Game, set, match. They cannot establish a chain."

"But they must know more than that. Don't you think? Why would Tommy admit that at this stage?"

"Because he is supposed to. Tommy is not the old Tommy. Everyone in the Tri-Cities will tell you that. Besides, what else could they know?"

Rusty does not answer, but after a minute he describes a visit that Tommy Molto made to him two days ago in the prison, where Tommy told him that some people in his office believe Rusty pleaded guilty to a crime he did not commit. Even the famously unflappable Sandy Stern cannot keep from jolting visibly.

"Forgive me," Stern says, "I am only the poor lawyer, but it might have been wise to let us know that."

"I'm sorry, Sandy. I realize this sounds ridiculous, but I took it as a private conversation."

"I see," says Stern. Rusty has turned to see Sandy in the rear seat, and behind his back Marta soundlessly mimes banging the heel of her palm against her forehead. In the rear seat between Nat and Sandy, I feel Nat's grip tighten on my hand, as he silently ticks his head back and forth. None of us is ever going to understand.

We are in Nearing a few minutes after four. The neighborhood is quiet. In the driveway, there is another round of hugs. Nat and I transfer the groceries from my car to Rusty's in the garage, and we stand aside to wave him on his way to Skageon. Instead, the ignition on Rusty's Camry gives one polite cough, a little like the sound Sandy keeps making, and goes utterly silent. Dead.

"The best laid plans," says Rusty as he climbs out. I offer my car, but Nat reminds me that I have a dep tomorrow in Greenwood County. For a second, the five of us debate alternatives. Marta is eager to get her father home in order not to deplete him further, but she has a set of jumper cables at her house, which is nearby. Male bulk will be required to move the two seventy-pound bags of fertilizer that are blocking the cabinet. If the car won't start after the jump, then we'll try to figure a way for Rusty to rent or borrow a ride.

I get into my car to drive Nat over, but he comes around to my side and whispers through the open window, "Don't leave him alone, not now."

I stare at him for just a second, then hand over the keys. Nat is already behind the wheel when he leans out to whisper again.

"See if he wants breakfast, maybe? Do you mind?"

Rusty has already gone inside the house alone when I follow through the garage with two bags of groceries. He has plugged in his cell phone and is at the kitchen window, peeking through the curtains.

"Reporters?" I ask.

"No, no. I thought I might have seen a light next door. The Gregoriuses always have a car or two nobody is driving."

The truth is that he seems far better than I would have hoped. During the trial and the months leading up to it, he had become a man as different in a short space of time as anybody I have ever known. Stern seemed less depleted by mortal illness. Rusty was ruined and empty, a sunken ship. Sometimes when we were with him, I watched him greet people he knew on the street. He still remembered what to say. He would stick out his hand at the right moment, but it was almost as if he were afraid to occupy his space on earth. I was never sure Nat noticed any of this. He was so busy trying to come to terms with his father, he did not seem to realize that the guy he'd known had largely fled. But now he's back. And it is not freedom to thank. I know that instantly. It is having been punished, paying a price.

"Nat thought you might want some breakfast," I say.

He takes a step closer to peek into the bags. "Is there any fresh fruit in there? I never thought the first thing I'd long for after prison is a strawberry."

A close observer always of both his parents, Nat had bought blueberries and strawberries, and I start to wash and cut.

As the tap runs, Rusty says behind me, "Barbara always wanted to redo this kitchen. She just hated the idea of having workmen in here all the time."

I look around. He's right. The place is dated and small. The cherry cabinets are still beautiful, but everything else is out of style. Still, the mention of Barbara is odd. As occurs often, the ghostly way Barbara haunted this household moves through me, the intensity of the passion she felt for her son and the persisting depths of her unhappiness. She was one of those people who needed courage to live.

"I didn't kill her," he says. I glance back very briefly to see him seated at the cherry kitchen table, with its old-fashioned scalloped edge, staring to observe my reaction.

"I know," I say. "Were you afraid I doubted that?"

My response is honest, but it ignores the months it took for me to feel comfortable with that conclusion. My problem, much as I have never wanted to judge the proof, is my own preloaded software. I stitch together evidence like some lady who quilts obsessively. It's why I was destined for the legal profession, the canny girl who was looking out for her mother and herself from an early age, searching the world for signs and putting them together. So there was no way for me not to ponder the most uncomfortable things I knew-that Rusty went to consult Prima Dana forty-eight hours after I told him I was going to start seeing Nat or the savage look with which he left the Dulcimer that day, a man smelting in the heat of his own rage. Worst of all, I remembered the read receipts that seemed to indicate that Barbara had gone through my e-mails to Rusty. She had betrayed nothing the night Nat and I had come to Nearing, but I often imagined that there had finally been a shattering scene between Rusty and her after we left.

Yet I could never make myself envision murder. My time with Rusty is far behind me. Yet I saw enough of his essence in those few months to be sure he is not a killer.

"At moments," he answers now.

"Is that why you thought I'd fiddled with your computer? I mean, Tommy's right, isn't he? You pleaded guilty to something you didn't do." I have thought of this before, but the exchange with Stern in the SUV clinched it for me.

"I didn't know what to think, Anna. I knew I didn't do it. I was never completely confident in the so-called experts, but they kept insisting that the computer was fully sealed when it was brought to court, so that ruled out someone in Molto's office-which by the way has got to be the answer. Don't you think? Tommy can say whatever he wants for public consumption. He knows somebody who works for him got around the seals and added the card in order to sucker-punch us."

That point has not been quite as clear in my mind until he says it, but I realize he is right. I have never forgotten Molto fooled around with the evidence decades ago, and I feel a little embarrassed I did not recognize this before. We will never know what turned the PA around now. Probably fear of exposure, for some reason.

"Anyway," he says, "back in June, I thought the only people who could have done it were Nat or you. Or the two of you together. The experts never seemed to focus on that, the possibility the two of you could have worked in concert to put the card on there. The last thing I wanted was for the whole inquiry to go on long enough for that thought to finally dawn on Tommy and Gorvetich.

"But I couldn't ever make sense of why either of you would have done something like that. A thousand things went through my mind. And made sense for a couple of seconds. But one of them was that you believed I was guilty and tried to get me out of it because you blamed yourself for me killing Barbara, thinking I did it so I could get you back."

I am sweeping the last of the berries into a bowl, and I avoid turning to him for a second. The very worst moment I had in the last two years was when those read receipts turned up on my computer, and next worst was the day Nat called me from the courthouse to say, 'She knew. My mom knew.' The banker had just testified, and Nat had taken one of his familiar breaks to cry. I love the fact that he cries. I have realized in the last year that I have waited all my life for a man who never claims to be immune to the pain of life, unlike that great fake I have for a mother.

'Knew?' I asked. 'What did she know?' Because of everything that emerged in court I realize that Barbara was putting on an act for Nat's sake the night before she died, but in the moment she had been convincing, and there were times in the last year when I harbored a faint hope that the read receipts were triggered by something else, like the scrubbing program run on Rusty's PC, and that Barbara had died unknowing. Now I crashed into my own despair. I have been stabbed at so often by guilt and apprehension that it was hard to believe they could cut sharper or deeper, yet I felt then as if I were being dissected. Generally speaking, I have been good throughout my life at faking my way along, especially when I am suffering. But my difficulty in understanding myself sometimes paralyzes me. Why did I ever want Rusty? And what seems like the greatest mystery of all-why didn't I ever give a fig about Barbara? In the past two months, there has been a parade of moments when I have nearly been knocked cold by the recognition of the monumental pain I caused her in the last week of her life. Why didn't I see the stakes for her when I was throwing myself at her husband? Who was I? It's like trying to understand why I once jumped off a rock forty feet above the Kindle while I was in high school and nearly killed myself when I lost consciousness for a second with the impact. Why did I think that was fun?

In my own defense, I really didn't know how edgy Barbara was. Before we became intimate, Rusty always presented her as difficult rather than crazy, speaking of Barbara much the way the Indians do the Pakistanis, or the Greeks talk about the Turks, traditional enemies at peace along an uneasy border. At the time, I took that only as an opening, an opportunity. I never considered the harm to her. Because, as is always true of people who do the wrong thing, I was certain we would never be caught.

I place the berries on the table in front of him and hand over a fork.

"You having any?" he asks.

"No appetite." I smile weakly. "Did you?"

"What?"

"Still want me back when Barbara died?"

"No. Not really. Not by then."

I have a dozen excuses for what went on with Rusty. The law seemed such a grand point of arrival for me, a destiny I was so long headed toward. I wanted to absorb everything, do everything. It was like standing before a temple. And I knew how much longing rested unexpressed inside him. You could almost hear it from him, like a brake grinding on a drum. I believed, stupidly, I would be good for him. And I knew that whatever the open sesame was with men, I hadn't found it yet, and this was another key to try. But in the end, I was using him, and I realized that. I desperately wanted somebody like him, somebody important, to want me, as if I would somehow possess everything the world had poured on him, if he was willing to forsake it all for me. It made sense. That's all I can say. In the irrational internal way the heart and mind can mesh. It made sense then and makes no sense now. At moments, I feel like begging, Take me back, put me back there so I can figure out who that girl was two years ago. It would not matter, anyway. I will always have to live with the regret.

"I didn't think so," I say. "That night Nat and I were here, the night before she died? You seemed to have let go of it. It's one more reason I never thought you killed her. I just didn't know why you'd gotten to that point so quickly."

"Because it turned out I wanted my son more than I wanted you. Is that too blunt?"

"No."

"It helped me put things in perspective. Not that it wasn't an awful situation. It still is, I suppose."

I don't think he means to accuse me, but of course, I am guilty enough to feel accused anyway.

"You are in love with him, right?" Rusty asks.

"Madly. Insanely. Do you mind my saying that?"

"It's what I want to hear."

Just uttering this little about Nat, I feel my heart swell, and tears forcing themselves to my eyes.

"He is the sweetest man in the world. Brilliant and funny. But so sweet. So kind." Why did it take me so long to see that was what I needed, someone who wants my care and can return it?

"A lot more than I am," Rusty says.

We both know that's true. "He had nicer parents," I answer.

Rusty looks away. "And he still has no clue?"

I shrug. How do we ever know what's in someone else's heart or mind? If we are always a mystery to ourselves, then what is the chance of fully understanding anybody else? None, really.

"I don't think so. I've started to tell him a thousand times, but I always stop myself."

"I think that's right," Rusty says. "Nothing to gain."

"Nothing," I say.

I have returned to see my therapist several times, but Dennis has no answers to the insane opera in which I found myself enmeshed after Barbara died, in part because he told me not to see Nat in the first place. But there's one thing Dennis and I always agree on, and that's that telling Nat the truth now would be impossibly destructive-not only of us, but of him. Most of what he assumed about his life on earth has shifted already in the last year. I can't ask him to pay another price just to relieve my overwhelming guilt. For me, this was always going to be a relationship built across the crater of a volcano. I have to walk those dangerous heights alone.

But people get used to things. Rusty got used to prison, amputees learn to live without limbs. If I can stay with Nat, the present will overwhelm the past. I can see us in a house, with kids, frantic with two jobs and figuring out who is going to be able to get home in time to pick up from the soccer games, can envision us anchored in a world entirely of our own making and still thrilled to the core by who we are to each other. I can see that. But I am not sure how to get from here to there. I kept thinking that if we could hold it together until the trial ended, we would be able to go on, a day at a time, and I still believe that now.

"I'm going to leave you two in peace," he says. "I can't really live here. Not now," he says. "Maybe I can come back eventually." He's quiet a second. "Can I ask something really personal?"

I am instantly afraid, until he says, "Do I have any hope of grandchildren?"

I just turn to him and smile.

"Wild horses," he tells me.

Outside, the garage door creaks and clatters. Nat is back. We both look in that direction. I stand up and Rusty gets up, too. I hug him quickly, but in earnest this time, with the sincerity and appreciation people always owe somebody they loved.

Then I head to the garage door to greet my sweet, sweet man. But before I get there, I turn back.

"You know, there's another reason I love him," I say.

"Which is?"

"There are ways he's a lot like you."

The Camry starts. With the long drive north, the battery will recharge. Nat gives Rusty the cables just in case, then we stand on the driveway, waving. The car backs down the drive, then Rusty stops and gets out, and he and Nat hug each other yet again. I think one of the hardest things in a relationship is dealing with the way your partner sees his parents. I learned that in my marriage to Paul, the fact he didn't understand how his mom tended to boss him, and I've witnessed similar things a number of times since. It's like watching someone struggle with Chinese handcuffs. You keep thinking, No, in, push in, don't pull back, they just get tighter, and the poor sap, this guy you love or hope to love, struggles anyway. I am glad for Rusty and for Nat, glad for this night, but I know they still have oceans left to swim across.

Then Nat and I start home. When you love someone, he is your life. The first principle of existence. And because of that, he has the power to change you and everything you know. It is like suddenly turning a map over so that south is at the top. It's still correct, still able to get you to anyplace you want to go. But it could not seem more different.

As an intellectual matter, I remember that I clerked for Nat's father and was once mad for him. I remember that I actually knew Rusty long before I first met Nat. But Nat was someone else then, a stick figure compared with the person who now dominates my life, while Rusty's chief significance today lies in the inevitable ways he can affect his son. My life is Nat. With Rusty gone, I feel the utter solidity of that fact.

We are both quiet, humming with our stuff. It has been quite a night.

"I need to tell you something," I say suddenly as we are crossing the Nearing Bridge. There is pink light leaking up from the horizon, but the buildings in Center City are still blazing, reflecting gorgeously on the water.

"What?" he asks.

"It's upsetting, but I want you to hear this now. Okay?"

When I glance over, he nods, looking darkly pensive beneath those thick eyebrows.

"When I moved in with Dede Wirklich after my divorce, I was working at Masterston Buff, writing ad copy, and still trying to finish college at night. And I was taking this advanced macroeconomics class in the U Business School. I'd gotten an A plus in Intro Econ, and I thought I was good at math and could sail through. The prof was Garth Morse. Remember that name? He was one of Clinton's economic advisers, and he's still on TV all the time, because he's really smooth and good-looking, and I thought it would be totally cool to take a class from somebody like that. But it was way, way over my head, with all these out-there equations that the B students understood instantly. I was upset anyway about leaving Paul and having a hard time concentrating, and I got back the midterm and there was this big fat F. So I went to see Morse. And I was in his office about ten minutes, and he gives me this long, long look, like he's seen too many old movies, and says, 'This is too complicated, we need to talk about it over dinner.' And okay, I wasn't totally surprised. He had a reputation. He thought he was God's gift. And Dede was like, 'Are you crazy, go ahead, you want to stay in college forever?' He really was good-looking and a pretty exciting, interesting guy, totally charismatic. But still. His wife was pregnant. I don't remember how I knew that-maybe he mentioned it in class-but that part really bothered me. But Dede had a point, I needed to graduate and move on, and I really couldn't stand just then, right after my marriage ended, to fail at anything else. And so-"

Nat hits the brakes so hard that I clutch and think about the air bag, when I can think at all. I look out the windshield to see what we hit. We are on the shoulder, right at the foot of the bridge.

"Are you okay?" I ask.

He has released his seat belt so he can bring his face close to mine.

"Why are you telling me this?" he asks. "Why now? Tonight?"

I shrug. "Because I'm sleep-deprived?"

"Do you love me?" he asks me then.

"Of course. Of course. Like I've never loved anybody else." I so mean that. He knows. I know he knows.

"Do you think I love you?"

"Yes."

"I love you," he says. "I love you. I don't need to know the worst things you've ever done. I know you had a rough time getting to me. And I had a rough time getting to you. But we're together. And together we're better people than we've ever been. I really believe that. That's all." He leans over to kiss me softly, looks in my eyes another second, then checks the mirrors before pulling the car back onto the road.

When you are twenty, you come to your boyfriends fresh. You are still hoping to find The One, and everybody who went before is really just a stepping-stone to that place and doesn't really matter. But at thirty-six-thirty-six!-that's no longer the case. You have been to the summit, believed in somebody's love forever, had the greatest sex you think you'll ever know-and somehow moved on to find something else. You have come to whoever is with you now along a rope line of experiences. You both know it. You cannot pretend what's in the past didn't happen. But it's the past, the way Sodom and Gomorrah lay in ash behind Lot's wife, who should have known better than to look back. Everybody understands when you get to this age that you carry history along, a person, a time whose effects cannot be fully forgotten. Nat has Kat, who I know still e-mails now and then and manages to upset him. And that is how it will be with Rusty and what happened with him. I see that now. He will be like the telltale heart still beating every now and then in the wall. But gone. It will be the past I lived, crazy but over, the past that somehow brought me to the life I really, really want that I will live every day with Nat.