Page 87 of The Triangle

“All of this,” I continue, fanning my hands out, “all of this. This world. All of it. Is ours. Yours, mine, and Danny’s. It is if we want it to be.”

“I don’t—”

“I’m saying that we can stay. If we want.”

“What? Stay where? Here?”

“Yes. Here. No one knows where we are. No one can find us. We can stay here. Our own universe. Our own ecosystem. We can escape all the bullshit that’s out there, beyond, and we can have a utopia here. We can stop the chase and just… be.”

Her eyes get watery. She blinks. She swallows.

“What do you think, nunu? Would you like that?”

Her chin quivers and then she starts laughing hysterically.

“You,” she says, “want to stop the chase. You, Alec van den Berg, want to just… be.”

“I—”

“Sweetheart,” she says, taking my face in her hands like I’m a daft five-year-old, “I fuckin’ adore you, but there is no way in a million years that you will ever be satisfied just ‘being.’”

For some reason that I can’t quite put my finger on, I am reminded of being slapped by my father when I was a boy.

I start, “But what I’m saying is—”

“And how would we eat?” she asks. “How would we get food? Supplies? Get them brought in from somewhere? Kind of defeats the idea of escaping and being hidden away from everything, doesn’t it?”

She looks at me earnestly. Like she can’t believe what a dullard I am.

She’s right.

Of course, she’s right. And of course, it was a foolish thing to think, much less say aloud. But I’ve never before felt the way I feel this morning and I don’t quite know how to engage with it. My father instilled in me the value of strength and the cost of vulnerability to such a degree that I don’t even know if what I’m experiencing is actually the sensation of being vulnerable, but it’s most definitely unwelcome.

“I was just making a metaphor, Christine.” It is the best, and maybe only, response I can think of that will quash this moment of shameful weakness I have just displayed, and right our bearings.

“Oh,” she says, nodding.

I kiss her again on the head. “Just go sit over there for a second and let me make this call, yeah?”

She keeps nodding. “Who are you calling?”

“Lars. Since we’re clearly not going to stay here forever”—I wink, back on form—“we need to decipher exactly what might be waiting for us when we depart.”

I can’t grasp a handle on her expression. It’s not quite disappointment. Not entirely sorrow. Maybe confusion? I can’t be sure.

I take her around the waist, press my lips to hers, and then allow my tongue to slip into her mouth. She breathes into the kiss, her hands sliding under my coat to grab for my belt. I laugh and pull back, kissing her on the forehead as I do.

“You’ll catch cold,” I say.

“It’ll be worth it,” she responds, reaching for me again.

I continue laughing as I attempt to compel her to keep her hands to herself. Although I don’t particularly want to.

“As soon as we get back inside,” I say. “We’ll warm up. Maybe we’ll get lucky and Danny’ll still be in the shower. We can get clean together.”

“I don’t wanna get clean,” she says.

“Another metaphor, luv.”