Page 90 of Molt

“I killed you.”

Her face goes still. “What?”

“I think...” My voice breaks. “I think I killed you.”

She releases my shirt. The distance between us is only inches but feels like miles. “When?”

“More than once.”

Her lips part.

I continue before I lose the ability. “And you killed me.”

She stares. “How many times?”

“I don’t know.”

“You said there were eight cycles.”

“I know.”

“How many?”

I shake my head. “I don’t fucking know.”

She turns away.

“Lenora.”

“Don’t.”

There it is. The word from 1921. Same tone. Same hurt.

“Don’t touch me.”

I stop.

The flashlight trembles in her hand. “Tell me.”

“You don’t want to hear it.”

“Tell me.”

So I do.

The chair. The ropes. The fireplace poker. The gun. Her trying to cut her throat in the snow. Me locking doors. Her begging me to stop loving her. Me refusing. Every time one of us tried to control the cycle, we became crueler. More desperate. More afraid.

Love rotted into possession. Fear turned into violence.

By the time the molt reached its final days, neither of us knew whether we were trying to save each other or destroy each other first.

Lenora listens silently.

When I finish, she asks “Did you ever murder me?”

The question lands differently.

Murder. Not accident. Not mercy. Not some terrible choice made together.