“No.” If I talk to him, I won’t ever be able to say goodbye. I need to cut off contact with him, for both our benefits. I curve around him and head to the counter to check out.
He stays put against the wall with the charms but exits with me once I’ve paid.
“Leave me alone, Kit,” I say as I walk down the street at a pretty impressive speed. I take a turn into the first coffee shop I see and breathe a sigh of relief when he doesn’t follow me in. He’s taken the hint. Maybe I’ll never see him again. That will have to be okay.
When I take another step, moving toward a better hiding spot, a purple-haired worker in a tan apron grabs me by the arm and says, “Give me five minutes.”
“What?” I question, but then I look in his eyes. “Fuck.No, Kit.” I spin on my heel and leave the coffee shop. I’m speed walking again.
A middle-aged Latina woman runs up beside me and says, “Lacy, I am begging you. One minute.”
“No.”
I’m running now, hoping my memory of how to get back to the subway is accurate. When I locate the telling green entrance, I practically fly down the stairs and through the turnstile. Kitseems to be nowhere around me, but I’m whipping my head around wildly trying to see. There is no way he has given up that easily. The train comes, and I board with a group of people, snatching an empty seat. I sit on the light-blue bench as the train pulls out of the station, lean forward with my head in my hands, and take deep breaths.
I suddenly feel a hand on my back, and an elderly Asian woman says to me, “I’m not mad at you, I promise, Lace.”
I drag my head up to look at him. “Kit…I don’t care. I don’t…I don’t know what you want.”
“To keep you safe. That’s all I ever wanted.”
I sit up straight and pull up the corner of my shirt to show him the tattoo again. “I’m keeping myself safe, remember?”
He frowns at the tattoo. “That was a bold step. You wanted rid of me that badly? That you couldn’t have told me of this plan? I would have helped. Iwas tryingto help you.”
“Matthias helped me. After you left.”
He doesn’t correct me, pointing out that I’m the one who forced him away. “He did? How?”
“Research, Kit. And it didn’t take us that long to find this solution.Wereyou even trying?”
“Of course. I told you a tattoo was a possibility, but I wasn’t sure if it would work.”
“Butwhydidn’t we try it? I could have gotten the tattoo, then you could have tried to possess me again, and when that didn’t work, we would have known.”
His mouth purses in a fine line.
I answer for him. “Because that would have meant I didn’tneed you anymore. You didn’t want to let me go. You were being selfish.”
The train pulls into the next station, and even though it is not the one I need to be at, I run out and get back to street level. I spot a yellow cab with its light on and stick my hand out to hail it like an old-fashioned New Yorker. I hop in with a relieved exhale and say, “Grand Central, please.”
The cabbie starts driving then rotates fully around and says, “Was the exorcism on purpose, or did you just take the opportunity when it was handed to you?”
I should jump out the window. “Jesus, Kit! Keep your eyes on the road!”
He turns back around, swerving into another lane, and says, “I don’t actually know where Grand Central is.”
“Pull the car over!”
He does as I ask.
I sigh, leaning forward toward the glass divider, and say, “Listen. I am sorry that I threw you out like that. I found an opportunity to escape, and I took it. Matthias told me the episode I had to put on.”
“S1E4,” he says, remembering the card.
I grimace. “I couldn’t…I couldn’t be locked up like that. I waslosingmyself. A body isn’t meant to be shared by two people.”
I get out of the cab. It’s a nice day—I’ll walk the rest of the way.
