“I would be unfair to myself if I said I did not try. I did, even if desultorily. But desire is a curious thing. If it does not exist it does not exist and there is nothing you can do to conjure it up. Worse still, as I discovered, when desire begins to sink, like a capsizing ship it takes down a lot with it. In our case it took down the conversation, the laughter, the sharing, the concern, the dreams and nearly - the most important thing, the most important thing - and nearly the affection too. Soon my sinking desire had taken everything else down with it to the floor of the sea, and only affection remained like the bobbing hand of a drowning man, poised perilously between life and death. More than once she tried to seize the moment and open up the issue. She did it with a hard face and a soft face; she did it when I was idling on the terrace and when I was in the thick of my works; first thing in the morning and last thing at night. We need to talk.Yes.Do you want to talk?Sure.What's happening?I don't know.Is there someone else?No.Is it something I did?Oh no.Then what the hell's happening?I don't know.Is there anything you want to talk to me about?I don't know.What do you mean you don't know?I don't know.What do you mean you don't know?I don't know. That's what I mean - I don't know.Toc toc toc. All the while I tried to save that bobbing hand - of affection - from vanishing. I felt somehow that if it drowned there would not be a single pointer on the wide stormy surface to show me where our great love had once stood. That bobbing hand of affection was a marker, a buoy, holding out the hope that one day we could salvage the sunken ship. If it drowned, our coordinates would be completely lost and we would not know where to even begin looking. Even in my weird state, it was an image of such desolation that it made my heart lurch wildly. *** For a long time, with her immense pride in herself - in us - she did not turn to anyone for help. Not friends, not family. For simply too long she imagined this was a passing phase, but then, as the weeks rolled by, through slow accretion the awful truth began to settle on her. By then she had run through all the plays of a relationship: withdrawal, sulking, anger, seduction, inquisition, affection, threat. Logic, love, lust.Now the epitaph was beginning to creep up on her. Acceptance. ”

“Why have you done all this for me?" She turned her head to look at him. "Tell me the truth."He shook his head slowly."I don't think I could have been more terrified of the devil than I was of you," she said, "when it was happening and in my thoughts and nightmares afterward. And when you came home to Willoughby and I realized that the Duke of Ridgeway was you, I thought I would die from the horror of it."His face was expressionless. "I know," he said."I was afraid of your hands more than anything," she said. "They are beautiful hands."He said nothing."When did it all change?" she asked. She turned completely toward him and closed the distance between them. "You will not say the words yourself. But they are the same words as the ones on my lips, aren't they?"She watched him swallow."For the rest of my life I will regret saying them," she said. "But I believe I would regret far more not saying them.""Fleur," he said, and reached out a staying hand."I love you," she said."No.""I love you.""It is just that we have spent a few days together," he said, "and talked a great deal and got to know each other. It is just that I have been able to help you a little and you are feeling grateful to me.""I love you," she said."Fleur."She reached up to touch his scar. "I am glad I did not know you before this happened," she said. "I do not believe I would have been able to stand the pain.""Fleur," he said, taking her wrist in his hand."Are you crying?" she said. She lifted both arms and wrapped them about his neck and laid her cheek against his shoulder. "Don't, my love. I did not mean to lay a burden on you. I don't mean to do so. I only want you to know that you are loved and always will be.""Fleur," he said, his voice husky from his tears, "I have nothing to offer you, my love. I have nothing to give you. My loyalty is given elsewhere. I didn't want this to happen. I don't want it to happen. You will meet someone else. When I am gone you will forget and you will be happy."She lifted her head and looked into his face. She wiped away one of his tears with one finger. "I am not asking anything in return," she said. "I just want to give you something, Adam. A free gift. My love. Not a burden, but a gift. To take with you when you go, even though we will never see each other again."He framed her face with his hands and gazed down into it. "I so very nearly did not recognize you," he said. "You were so wretchedly thin, Fleur, and pale. Your lips were dry and cracked, your hair dull and lifeless. But I did know you for all that. I think I would still be in London searching for you if you had not gone to that agency. But it's too late, love. Six years too late.”

“I think the way I feel when I look at Evan comes from her. In pictures taken the day she married my dad, she was reckless, laughing, spinning around in circles. She looked like her whole world was him. She looked a kind of happy I can't even imagine.I don't want that. I don't want to be like that. I don' want to feel the way she did because I know what happens when you do. You love with your whole heart, with everything, and you wake up one morning and kiss someone good-bye the way you always do except you mean it as good-bye forever. ”

“Clay, did you ever love me?"I'm studying a billboard and say that I didn't hear what she said."I asked if you ever loved me?"On the terrace the sun bursts into my eyes and for one blinding moment I see myself clearly. I remember the first time we made love, in the house in Palm Springs, her body tan and wet, lying against cool, white sheets."Don't do this, Blair," I tell her."Just tell me."I don't say anything."Is it such a hard question to answer?"I look at her straight on."Yes or no?""Why?""Damnit, Clay," she sighs."Yeah, sure, I guess.""Don't lie to me.""What in the fuck do you want to hear?""Just tell me," she says, her voice rising."No," I almost shout. "I never did." I almost start to laugh.She draws in a breath and says, "Thank you. That's all I wanted to know." She sips her wine."Did you ever love me?" I ask her back, though by now I can't even care.She pauses. "I thought about it and yeah, I did once. I mean I really did. Everything was all right for a while. You were kind." She looks down and then goes on. "But it was like you weren't there. Oh shit, this isn't going to make any sense." She stops.I look at her, waiting for her to go on, looking up at the billboard. Disappear Here."I don't know if any other person I've been with has been really there, either ... but at least they tried."I finger the menu; put the cigarette out."You never did. Other people made an effort and you just ... It was just beyond you." She takes another sip of her wine. "You were never there. I felt sorry for you for a little while, but then I found it hard to. You're a beautiful boy, Clay, but that's about it."I watch the cars pass by on Sunset."It's hard to feel sorry for someone who doesn't care.""Yeah?" I ask."What do you care about? What makes you happy?""Nothing. Nothing makes me happy. I like nothing," I tell her."Did you ever care about me, Clay?"I don't say anything, look back at the menu."Did you ever care about me?" she asks again."I don't want to care. If I care about things, it'll just be worse, it'll just be another thing to worry about. It's less painful if I don't care.""I cared about you for a little while."I don't say anything.She takes off her sunglasses and finally says, "I'll see you later, Clay." She gets up."Where are you going?" I suddenly don't want to leave Blair here. I almost want to take her back with me."Have to meet someone for lunch.""But what about us?""What about us?" She stands there for a moment, waiting. I keep staring at the billboard until it begins to blur and when my vision becomes clearer I watch as Blair's car glides out of the parking lot and becomes lost in the haze of traffic on Sunset. The waiter comes over and asks, "Is everything okay, sir?"I look up and put my sunglasses on and try to smile. "Yeah.”

“I did not try to keep her. I do not think I even wanted to. Between us, for the moment, there was nothing more to be said. I wanted above all to be alone and think things over. When she was ready to go, she said, "Better give me the gun. You won't want it on the journey, and if there is a check, I can manage it better than you can. But unloaded, please." I did not ask her how she would manage. I found I trusted her completely in things like that, and my own recent record did not inspire much confidence in the matter of keeping my weaponry out of enemy hands.”

“I would like to be able to say that she broke my heart but I know better. I broke my own heart. I can't say that she did it and get behind that statement in any real way. I know too much. The only one I can blame for my loneliness is myself. Even if I did think that she did it to me I wouldn't feel any better. Tonight I was watching a movie and this actor in the film looked like her when she had a profile shot. She did not break my heart I did. I don't know why I would do something this painful to myself. I wish I would stop it's been months now and I'm still hurting myself nightly. I can avoid it for awhile and then it comes back.”