The air-conditioning was on, and she was chilly in the dress, her flesh tight with goose bumps. Shopping for it had been fun. Playing the part in advance, life coming into focus, seeming to matter. Earlier in the afternoon, when she’d gotten dolled up, she’d stood in front of the mirror in her bedroom and liked what she saw. Not a woman in her thirties with a shit job and no plans. A heartbreaker femme fatale in a dress cut too low for a bra, gearing up for a robbery. She’d stood and stared, and then hiked the edge of the skirt up, hooked her thumbs in the waist of her panties and pulled them off. The feeling of air at the hinge of her thighs had been electric. Hundred-proof life.

“I like your place,” Mitch said.

“Thanks.” She took another sip of vodka. “Me too.”

He nodded, looked around. She could see him struggling for something to say. “Been here long?”

“About five years. Before I moved here I’d been living with Brian-you never met him, did you?-and before that with some girlfriends. When things fell apart with Bry, I decided, enough; time to have my own space. Do things my way. You know?”

“I guess.”

“You don’t like living alone?”

“It’s OK.” He paused, shrugged. “Lonely sometimes.”

“I know. But there’s a good kind of loneliness too. Where you realize that maybe you are alone, but that it’s better than being someone you’re not.” Thinking back to Brian’s old apartment, the smell of cigarettes, him on the couch on weekend afternoons, goofy-haired, watching football. Something sweet in it at first. But somewhere along the line she’d realized that their present was their future, that Brian, nice as he was, would never change, never be anything else. That he didn’t want to. If he had his choice, it would be fifty more years of football Saturdays and Sunday-morning sex, of workday weeks and frozen pizza. Dropping dead within days of each other, shortly after a visit from the grandkids. It wasn’t long after that she started picking fights.

For no reason but to have something to say, she said, “You know one of my favorite things? Some days I’ll come home, pour a drink, and climb into bed with a couple of magazines. Not real magazines, Newsweek or anything. I mean junk. Celebrity baby magazines. And I’ll lay there in bed and drink and catch up on what crazy thing Britney Spears has done lately.”

He laughed. “Really?”

“Yeah. I don’t take it seriously. I mean, I like to check out the clothes and stuff, but that’s sort of an excuse. I know it’s silly, looking at the lives of these people I’ll never meet, don’t even want to. I just kind of get a kick out of being a voyeur.”

“Nothing wrong with that.” He took a swallow. “I actually know what you mean. Sometimes when I’m on break at the hotel, I’ll go up to the second floor of the lobby, where there’s this big balcony. Lean over and watch people.”

“Watch them what?”

“Just… watch them. Twice-divorced sales executives hitting on each other in the lounge. Tourists with cameras asking directions to Navy Pier. Couples that have been together so long they don’t talk, don’t seem to need to. If you watch long enough, you start to see that everybody looks like they’re missing something. Like we all lost something and we’re all looking for it.”

“True love?”

He laughed. “I read a poem once, had a line that went something like, ‘the heart asks more than life can give.’ I think it’s that, really. We all want everything. But we’d settle for a sense that things matter. That there’s more to it than just getting up in the morning and making it through a day.”

“Do you see anybody who has that?”

“Not very many.”

“But some.”

“Yeah. Some.”

Their eyes met and then slid apart. Without warning, an image hit, the blast of light spitting from Mitch’s hand, the way it seemed like it was the light that hit the man on the ground, that punched him in the heart and brought a dark circle to blossom on his shirt.

She set her drink down, covered her face with her hands. Her heart ached like something was trying to push it through her ribs. She pressed her palms against her cheeks, dug her nails into her forehead.

“Hey,” he said, his voice soft. She heard the click of his glass against the counter, and then he had his hands on her shoulders. The warmth felt good.

“Oh God.” She opened her hands, was surprised to see him close, ducking his head down to look up at her, concern on his face. Her voice came out tremulous. “What did we do?”

“What we had to.”

“How are you able to stand there and say that? I mean, you… you…”

Something happened in his eyes, a withdrawal and then a return, like a sea creature nearly surfacing before vanishing into the dark. He breathed through his nostrils. “I did it for you.”

“We can’t take this back. We did this, and we can’t take it back.”

“It’s what we wanted.”

“Not this.” Even as she said it, she heard a voice inside her, asking, Are you sure? If you could go back a week, to the life before, the one where nothing really mattered, where you kept everything at a distance-would you?

Yes, she thought. I would. I think.

“Come here,” he said. He stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her. She stood stiff at first, but it felt really good to have someone holding her. There was a comfort that drove away part of the horror. Jenn slid her arms under his, around his back, and buried her face in his chest. Her eyes were closed, and she could smell him, a faint hint of sweat. Her nose was running and her eyes were wet.

“It’s OK.” His voice was soft. “We’ll make it OK. I promise.”

She gave a hollow half laugh, then sniffed, stepped back. Wiped her nose with the back of her hand. “God, I feel like such an idiot. Some adventuress I turned out to be.”

“Don’t.”

“I just”-she picked her drink up, took a long pull-“I didn’t tell you this before, but when I was in the alley, that guy, he and I talked for a couple of minutes.”

“You talked? What did you say?” The fluorescent lights heightened the contrast between his pale skin and dark hair.

“I was trying to get rid of him. At first I just figured he was a normal person, and asked him to move his car. But when I realized who he was… My mind was just… I was trying to figure out what to do, how to get rid of him. Finally I threatened to scream rape, and that started to work, but you guys came out.” She shook her head. “I screwed up.”

“It sounds like you did fine. It was us that screwed things up.”

“No, but see, I had the chance. If I’d thought faster, he wouldn’t have been there. I mean, my part in this whole thing was small, and I should have been able to handle-I should have been able to help. But when it came down to it, I didn’t do anything.”

“Wait a second. You stood there and talked to this guy, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Knowing that he was a drug dealer with a gun. You managed to stand straight, talk to him, and cover our backs. Try to get rid of him. In an alley. Looking”-he gestured up and down her body-“like that.”

“Yeah, but-”

“Sounds to me like you were pretty brave.”

The words caught her by surprise. She raised her head to look at him, expecting a teasing smile, the kind of look Alex might wear, playful from a distance. Instead Mitch looked back with perfect sincerity, his eyes wide and steady.

Without thinking, she went up on tiptoes to kiss his cheek. His skin was rough with blue-black stubble, and she could smell the remnants of his aftershave. She felt him tense, even though she was barely touching him, like every muscle in his body clenched at once. She froze, then started to lean back. “I’m sorry.”

“No.” He put a hand on her arm, his touch gentle. His face was inches from hers, close enough that it was hard to focus. She could see him wrestling with something. In a bare whisper, he said, “Jenn…”