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“No,” she says, shaking her head. “Once I started researching you, I read most of your work. Specifically, I read your right-to-die piece.”
I put the letter on the table. I consider taking a seat. “So?”
“I thought it was beautifully written. It was informed, intelligent, balanced, and compassionate. It had heart. I admired the way you deftly handled an emotional and complicated topic.”
I don’t want to let her say anything nice to me, because I don’t want to have to thank her for it. But my mother instilled in me a politeness that kicks in when I least expect it. “Thank you.”
“When I read it, I suspected that you would do a beautiful job with my story.”
“Because of one small piece I wrote?”
“Because you’re talented, and if anyone could understand the complexities of who I am and what I’ve done, it was probably you. And the more I’ve gotten to know you, the more I know I was right. Whatever book you write about me, it will not have easy answers. But it will, I predict, be unflinching. I wanted to give you that letter, and I wanted you to write my story, because I believe you to be the very best person for the job.”
“So you put me through all this to assuage your guilt and make sure you got the book about your life that you wanted?”
Evelyn shakes her head, ready to correct me, but I’m not done.
“It’s amazing, really. How self-interested you can be. That even now, even when you appear to want to redeem yourself, it’s still about you.”
Evelyn puts up her hand. “Don’t act like you haven’t benefited from this. You’ve been a willing participant here. You wanted the story. You took advantage—deftly and smartly, I might add—of the position I put you in.”
“Evelyn, seriously,” I say. “Cut the crap.”
“You don’t want the story?” Evelyn asks, challenging me. “If you don’t want it, don’t take it. Let my story die with me. That is just fine.”
I am quiet, unsure how to respond, unsure how I want to respond.
Evelyn puts out her hand, expectantly. She’s not going to let the suggestion be hypothetical. It’s not rhetorical. It demands an answer. “Go ahead,” she says. “Get your notes and the recordings. We can burn them all right now.”
I don’t move, despite the fact that she gives me ample time to do so.
“I didn’t think so,” she says.
“It’s the least I deserve,” I tell her, defensive. “It’s the fucking least you can give me.”
“Nobody deserves anything,” Evelyn says. “It’s simply a matter of who’s willing to go and take it for themselves. And you, Monique, are a person who has proven to be willing to go out there and take what you want. So be honest about that. No one i
s just a victim or a victor. Everyone is somewhere in between. People who go around casting themselves as one or the other are not only kidding themselves, but they’re also painfully unoriginal.”
I get up from the table and walk to the sink. I wash my hands, because I hate how clammy they feel. I dry them. I look at her. “I hate you, you know.”
Evelyn nods. “Good for you. It’s such an uncomplicated feeling, isn’t it? Hatred?”
“Yes,” I say. “It is.”
“Everything else in life is more complex. Especially your father. That’s why I thought it was so important that you read that letter. I wanted you to know.”
“What, exactly? That he was innocent? Or that he loved a man?”
“That he loved you. Like that. He was willing to turn down romantic love in order to stand by your side. Do you know what an amazing father you had? Do you know how loved you were? Plenty of men say they’ll never leave their families, but your father was put to the test and didn’t even blink. I wanted you to know that. If I had a father like that, I would have wanted to know.”
No one is all good or all bad. I know this, of course. I had to learn it at a young age. But sometimes it’s easy to forget just how true it is. That it applies to everyone.
Until you’re sitting in front of the woman who put your father’s dead body in the driver’s seat of a car to save the reputation of her best friend—and you realize she held on to a letter for almost three decades because she wanted you to know how much you were loved.
She could have given me the letter earlier. She also could have thrown it away. There’s Evelyn Hugo for you. Somewhere in the middle.
I sit down and put my hands over my eyes, rubbing them, hoping that if I rub hard enough, maybe I can make my way to a different reality.
