“My question for you is: Why are you alone?” Her lips part as she straightens her posture. “I’m not alone. I’m here with the two of you.” “You know what I mean. We’re guests. Customers. We’re not constants in your life.” Each word is a knife wound. A blade to her heart, her stomach, her ribs. Lottie’s gaze does not leave her when she says, “What about when we’re gone?” That sentence is a blade across her throat. She is bleeding down her dress, into the fabric of the couch, watching it drip onto the floor, tap tap tapping like raindrops. “When you are gone,” she says, her voice hardly a
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