Dark Things I Adore

by Katie Lattari

  “Evie.” The voice rises up from the darkness of the forest. I close my eyes and let my body drink it in: the voice, my name.

  I turn and see Lance emerge from the darkness of the woods, right on time. He pulls the black ski mask from his head, his brown hair squashed and messy as it frees itself. His cheeks are flushed with chill and exertion. He looks at me with tenderness, with concern, shotgun broken over his arm.

  “Hi, my love,” I say, voice steadier than I expected. I see that the duffel bag slung over his shoulder looks full. As he breaks into the light, the angle of his entrance finally allows him a vantage to Max, and he can’t help but look up into the tree.

  “Did you get everything?” I ask, my voice hoarse, hoping to distract him from the sight. His mouth falls open, eyes still glued to the body in the tree. I grasp his chin and guide his gaze to meet mine.

  “Don’t look, please. Don’t look.” I shake my head, feeling queasy, feeling a little light-headed. We lock eyes. I swallow. “It’s not for you. It’s not yours to take on.” I stroke his cheek with my gloved thumb. He takes a shaky breath, refocuses. He squeezes his eyes shut for a few long moments, and so do I, resting my forehead against his. “It’s done,” I whisper. “It’s okay. I’m okay.” He nods his head against mine. We ease apart.

  “I—I got the notes, the drawings, all of it.” He nods, steam puffing from his mouth. “I turned off the lights on the trail.” I can see it’s taking everything in him to follow my request not to look up into the branches. Morbid curiosity. He unzips the bag and hands me a coat. I put it on immediately. “You’re shaking. Are you doing alright?” Lance places his gloved hand on my shoulder.

  “Fine.” I feel numb. Lance looks concerned and pale. “Let’s finish.”

  I make him stand facing away from the tree, looking out into the forest while I scale the familiar boughs and branches of the birch like a trained cat burglar, going from limb to limb, pulling down every singular piece of yellow fabric in the same way I put them up a few days ago. These flowing invocations of my mother. Of Coral. I ball the goldenrod jersey streamers up and throw them to Lance so he can bag them. I am careful, steady, fast, and soon I am on the ground again.

  I look over at Lance waiting for me to come to his side then remember the folded piece of paper I took from Max earlier. I take the square of paper from my bra and unfold it. The painting that started all of this, a dreadful smear of amber, goldenrod, Tuscan yellows. The painting Max used my mother to make.

  Animus. Max Durant. 1993.

  I swallow and crumple the paper in my hand, using every fiber of self-control to hold wracking sobs at bay. Lance’s strong back is to me. I can tell he’s on edge. That he wants to come to me. I look up at Max, and a tear spills onto my cheek. I wipe it quickly away, take a breath, and approach Lance. I stand in front of him and show him the page.

  “Burn that with the rest?” I ask. Lance nods, shoves it in his bag.

  I survey the scene around us and look at Max the way he is. I know it may take a lifetime to scrub the image from my mind. I look to sweet Lance and hope he can rid it, too, after all this, and fast. I go around and turn off all the lights affixed to the trees in the clearing but one. The one on the birch. The one on the birch is the light that’s always been part of the alternate trail that leads down to the lake, different from the one I took Max down on. I gaze up at the birch and at Max one last time.

  Lance and I move through the forest together silently, sure-footed as foxes. We follow the permanent tree lights that exist every fifty yards until the tree line that leads into the heart of Lupine Valley. Lance’s pickup is there.

  “You ready?” Lance asks me. I look around the dark, abandoned commons and cabins.

  “Ready,” I say. We both climb into his truck. He drives me out of Lupine Valley and back around to the Moosehead Scenic Byway trailhead where I pick up my station wagon. Lance follows me on the pitch-black roads back to the main entrance to Lupine Valley. We amble up the dirt driveway until we reach the parking lot, where I leave the wagon with the keys inside. It looks so sad sitting there by itself as I get into the front seat of Lance’s pickup once more before we drive back down the narrow, dark road.

  The ride back to my house vacillates between tense silence and mantra-like repetition of the next steps of the plan. He drops me at the end of my driveway.

  “See you after,” I say. Our gloved hands find each other through the window and squeeze. We lock eyes, and I know something in mine must look like those of a drowning woman wishing desperately to be pulled from the deep end. But he can’t help me past this point. The rest I must do on my own. His eyes are round pools of silent comfort. He squeezes my hand one last time then rolls up the window and backs out into the road. I watch his red taillights fade to nothingness, then I take the long, dark walk down the driveway in my mom’s dress, holding my grandfather’s gun.

  When I get to the driveway pad up by the house, I see with great relief that Lance has done his duty; I see no yellow streamers up in the apple trees or down at the tree line. He stopped here before joining me at Lupine Valley like he was supposed to. In the coming hours, he will take all of that yellow fabric and burn it. He will throw my note from the lakeside in with it. He will box up and store Coral’s notes and drawings from the trees for me. He will stow them and my hiking backpack with the thermoses in waterproof containers in the back of his large, wood shed. He will wait to hear from me.

  I turn to face the dark, looming house.

  Where I found so many of mom’s notes and drawings. Messages from the dead.

  I move through the blackness of the house into the kitchen. I take Max’s phone from the pocket of my dress and put it up on the counter. I retrieve a glass from beside the sink that Max used earlier in the day and put it on the counter near his phone. I take off my gloves and grab a glass for myself, put it next to his. I splash some gin from my liquor cabinet in each one. Then, gloves back on, I dump them both in the kitchen sink and then place the glasses back down on the counter with the bottle of gin.

  I go to my grandfather’s desk a few rooms over, pull an old edition of e. e. cummings’s complete works from the drawer, and remove a small, separate piece of paper that is pressed inside. I put the book back and return to the kitchen, placing the note near the tumblers. I lock the handgun and case away in the gun cabinet down the hall, and then I take my gloves off and climb the stairs to the second floor. Max’s things are littered very organically about his room. Not too messy. Not too tidy. He didn’t make his bed. Good. I go to my bedroom and quickly put mom’s yellow dress away on a hanger in the back of my closet. Same with the gloves. I do my usual nighttime routine. I brush my teeth. I floss. I wash my face. I moisturize. I put on a pretty white slip. I climb into bed. It’s 3:56 a.m. I toss and turn under the once-pristine covers to make it look slept in.

  The house is silent. My room and the hallway outside are dark. It’s been over an hour since Max hanged himself. I was smart enough to do some research on his computer in the lead-up to this, asking the internet how long it would take to die by hanging. I’d erased his search history each time I trespassed over the past year of course, lest he might see somehow what had been searched. But the police would look at his hard drive if they got any weird feelings about it at all. And there the keystrokes would be. My hard drive would have keystrokes about autumn recipes and best gifts for a thesis advisor. My computer would show that I was looking toward a celebration with my mentor. His computer would show he wasn’t looking toward any sort of future.

  I stay in bed as long as I can stomach it. It’s so quiet. Too quiet. By myself, in the large, dark master bedroom. I have never wanted Lance by my side more. The night outside is deep, dusted with faint moonlight. I make it thirteen minutes. I press the home screen on my phone and see it’s 4:09 a.m. My adrenaline and anxiety will let me wait no longer. I stare up into the ceiling, feeling elect
ric, feeling sick.

  It is important to go through all my planned playacting so it feels as real to me as possible. Method acting. I must do all of the steps. The last several hours never happened. You and Max went on a hike on the Moosehead Scenic Byway, and then on to the lake this afternoon. Then you returned home and enjoyed dinner, and later, a final nightcap in the kitchen. You went to bed, too tired to stay up and continue drinking with Max, who was not ready for bed. Now you’re waking up.

  I force a fake yawn and paw at the empty side of the bed, where Max likely assumed he would be by now. I should check on things downstairs, make sure he turned off the lights and blew out candles before he went to bed in his room. Make sure he locked the door—I bet he went out for a smoke. That would be like him to go out for a smoke, drunk, and then not close or lock the door properly. I make my face frown in consternation. It feels important to do this. To make it actual. I grab my phone from the side table and see it’s 4:11. I’d better go check so I can ease my mind and go back to sleep.

  I climb out of bed with a stretch and then go to the master bathroom, fill my little glass standing near the sink with water, and make myself drink half of it. I leave the little water glass next to the sink. Then I grab my robe from the back of the door and put it on, cinch it. I turn on the hall light when I get there so I can see, then pad down the hallway. Max’s door is open. I peek inside and see that his bed is empty. Still downstairs drinking? Lord help me.

  I turn on the light in the kitchen and find the two empty tumblers and the bottle on the counter. I see a small scrap of paper beside them. A note. A thrill of anxiety and fear tears through my body, and I momentarily pause in my progress. My heart is beating hard and fast. This is it. I feel terror for a moment. This is the most important and most dangerous part, now. Go.

  What’s done is done.

  I force my legs to move again.

  “Max?” I call in a shaky voice. “You there, Max? I thought you’d—you’d have gone to bed by now.” I get no response as I approach the counter, the tumblers, and the note, kept pristine and fresh looking after all these years hidden inside the e. e. cummings volume.

  Meet me in the place you showed me under the stars.

  M

  A romantic gesture perhaps, I lie to myself. That would either be the lake…or the clearing with the boulder and the birch I showed him today. I pretend that it worries me that he has left the house. That he has driven, on his own, all the way out to King City, possibly drunk. How could he have gotten there? I walk briskly over to the door leading out to the garage, flick on the light, and fling it open. My Gram’s old Toyota Tacoma is there. But my white Volvo wagon is gone.

  He really went. He took my car.

  I pretend to feel perturbed by this. Maybe even frightened. But perhaps it is a romantic gesture. At any rate, I have to go get him. His phone is on the counter, for god’s sake. So I can’t just call him and berate him to come home. I go upstairs and dress in an institute hoodie, jeans, socks, and sneakers. I grab my overcoat from the peg on the way out the door into the garage. I take out the old Tacoma and head toward King City.

  My headlights flare into the white side of my Volvo, parked in the lot below the commons.

  “Max’ll get himself lost, even with the lights,” I grumble to myself, aloud, trying for an ambiance of innocence in the air. I pick my way carefully across the short expanse of grass that leads to the lake path, the first guiding light already visible. Just what does Max have in mind down there? I feel sick at my own question, but I know I must ask it of myself. Emotion builds within me exponentially with every glowing beacon I approach and pass on my path.

  One light. Deep breath.

  Two lights. I stop without warning, feeling suddenly very alone.

  Three lights.

  Four.

  Five. Tears well in my eyes, my breath ragged and steamy before me in the night.

  Six lights.

  Seven lights.

  Eight.

  The clearing.

  The boulder.

  The birch.

  Max.

  I scream, and I start to cry, and it all feels very real—even to me. I rush over to him, hesitating only for a moment as I approach, wanting to see that the knife is as it was, that there could be no tricks, no impossible loopholes. But the knife is exactly as I left it, though Max’s body has turned about ninety degrees east. I swivel around to look at him, feeling ill. “Max!” He looks cold, like a side of beef. “Max!” I scream. “What—Wh-why? Max!”

  I scream, real tears gushing out of my eyes, real sobs clenching and spasming my throat and chest. The realness is important. Whatever part of Max I’m mourning, it is helpful. My mother flashes to mind, her desperate, disturbed notes, her visceral, painful drawings of me, the baby she could not fathom, the baby she could not see, the baby she could not completely understand, and I cry harder. I can’t tell anymore if it’s fake or real, what I’m feeling. It feels pretty real.

  What can I do?

  I pull out my cell phone. I dial 911.

  I say everything I should say. I sound exactly as I should sound.

  Thirteen

  Long Gone

  Audra

  Sunday, November 4, 2018

  The day is somber, the rain slashing down in a way that feels malicious, deliberate, the sky an angry, roiling sea of steel. Which is how Max would have wanted it, I’m sure. Dramatic. Across the street and down the block from where I’m parked, people are filing out of the Boston Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help, hunched against the onslaught under umbrellas, dark coats, funeral programs. Same place Ted Kennedy had his funeral. Not bad.

  I’m sitting in Gram’s old Tacoma, watching everyone come out the same way I watched them all go in. I thought for a second about going in to Max’s funeral when it was getting under way just over an hour ago. But I decided it wouldn’t be for the best. Too much hubbub has arisen around me, around that weekend since his death. So I sat in my own kind of vigil, the rain thrumming the cab of my truck, the sound overpowering, unrelenting. I wept. I can admit that. It was a buildup of everything, I think. The stress. The catharsis. Reliving my mother’s own death so viscerally. And the fact is, I’ve spent the last few years of my life singularly fixated on him, getting close to him, springing this plan on him—him, him, him—so now his absence feels palpable. Strange. Impossible, somehow. Impossible that what I did could be done. Impossible that I was the one to do it. And now he’s gone. Dead. And as his obituary reminded me, he was still a talented man only at midcareer.

  He had more in him. I’m sure this is what President Dana Switzer spoke of in her eulogy. Max’s dedication to his life’s work, which was both his own art and the institute itself. There would have been indirect hints of the way he died, I’m sure—but only hints, would be my guess. I’m sure she never said the word suicide. She must have said things like suffering, relief, trials, burden, burning too brightly, forgiveness, have mercy on his soul, etc. All the usual phrases.

  As soon as the news got out about what happened at Lupine Valley, it was clear to me that everyone had assumptions about why Max secretly traveled all the way to Maine to see me for a weekend, alone. Let them think what they want. I know the truth. I never let him touch me like that. I never let him kiss me. Over the past year, were there hugs he lingered in too long? Yes. Were there flirtatious comments or texts from time to time? Sure. I went along with it. I had to, to keep him close enough, to keep him within striking distance. But it went no further than that. I knew I had to keep the tease going if I had any chance of drawing him out of his comfort zone, if I had any chance at getting him to Maine. Max was known for having had affairs in the past, for being a little too friendly with students. Some of those stories—and new ones, too—came up again when he died. The Boston Globe has written a story about what happened, for Christ’s sake. The Bangor
Daily News, Portland Press Herald, too. In the first few pieces, as the details were still coming out, they mentioned these past indiscretions with a light touch, and they mentioned me in a separate breath and were fine with letting the readers draw their own conclusions.

  Renowned art professor dies by suicide in Maine.

  A Boston professor’s trip to student’s hometown ends in his tragic death.

  I was honest with the police. I had to be. I had to stick as close to the truth as possible. They would find the veiled texts I sent in return to his not-so-veiled texts. Because of this, all the dirty laundry came out—or most of it, anyway. Max Durant, esteemed artist and professor at the Boston Institute for the Visual Arts, died by suicide while on a weekend away with a student he’d hoped might become a lover. Some conjectured he had ended his life over the guilt because other affairs from the past then came to light, brought forth by other lovers who now made it clear his predatory nature with students had been a pattern of behavior, not a one-off. I have received so many emails from friends and colleagues with an incredible variety of tones in the last two weeks. Some are furious with me, calling me a slut, a whore. Saying that Max only liked my work best because he wanted to fuck me or was fucking me. Those are the ones that hurt the most, actually. You can call me a whore, a slut, whatever—that’s all meaningless. Because I know I was never with him that way. But a bad artist—that stings. Others have been more sympathetic, telling me that Max clearly had a history of seducing young women and that older, wiser people have fallen into such traps before. To take that part as a lesson. That set assured me that his death was not my fault. That I couldn’t blame myself.