Actually, he felt relieved. What was the point in calling her other than the fact that he said he would? She’d already stated her position, that he was crazy. Besides a pill, there wouldn’t be much she could add to that.

He smirked and put the phone down. There. I called.

It was surreal sitting all alone before a cold, dead fireplace in a big, empty house with a .357 Magnum in his hand. He’d theorized that actually buying the gun would help him think things through, get him past What if I… and down to I really can. It worked. A little. The weight of the steel, the feel of the grip, the smell of the oil, the rattle of the bullets in the box were real, not hypothetical. He was able to hold the barrel to his head, say “Bang,” and conceive more clearly what would follow. That was how he decided that down in the meadow—Mandy’s Meadow—would be a better place than in the living room. He would stay preserved in the winter cold until Shirley, the cops, or the neighbors found him, and there’d be no messy cleanup.

Yep. Surreal.

Amber the makeup girl carefully dabbed Mandy’s forehead with more foundation and powder. “You feeling nervous?”

Mandy was captivated by the pretty girl in the big mirror, but not out of vanity. She’d seen this girl in another mirror … and she was still wishing. She nodded at Amber’s question.

“Oh,” said Amber, giving her a looking over, “it’s showbiz, like any other gig. Forget the cameras. Just go out there and wow that audience.”

With everything Dane taught you, she thought, but all by yourself, cut loose and lonely. Small, but smile. A screwup, but you show ’em. Spread your wings and fly. God’s still with you even if he isn’t.

God?

“Hey, why the face?”

She put on the professional social interaction smile she’d been practicing. “Sorry. Just thinking.”

It’s not fair.

Applause came from the television on the wall. Preston Gabriel was back from a commercial break and introducing …

“Dwight Hoskins.”

Hoskins strode onto the stage looking like a flower vase. He shook Gabriel’s hand. Gabriel asked some questions and Hoskins talked about psychic powers: everyone has them, they just need to be developed, he developed his abilities through kung fu and learning the laws of nature from an old Chinese master …

Lord, if I only knew how to feel.

… learning to recognize his inner self, his outer self, and achieving a level of consciousness matching the absence of mind to the motions of the body …

Your grace is enough. I’d love to feel that.

Hoskins placed a pencil on a low table so that it teetered on the edge in precarious balance.

And Arnie—oooo, Arnie! I can’t explain it to him—maybe because You’ve never explained it to me!

Hoskins crouched, waved his hands about in cool, martial arts gesticulations, the pencil moved, the audience applauded.

So he can make a pencil move. Wow. Got a show to go with that?

Next came the phone book lying open on the same table, sideways in relation to Hoskins. Hoskins did his little martial arts dance again, slicing the air with his hands and striking poses, then came in close and made a few pages flip, apparently by themselves.

The audience was impressed, or maybe just being nice.

“It’s an old trick,” said Amber. “Preston’s going to nail him.”

Gabriel was talking about controlled conditions being a requirement for the challenge and bringing out a canister.

“A million dollars,” said Mandy.

“It started out as ten thousand thirty years ago and it’s grown from there, probably because nobody’s ever won it.”

“Nobody?”

“Nope. Nobody’s ever produced a psychic phenomenon that Preston hasn’t been able to expose.”

Gabriel was spreading Styrofoam packing pellets all around the phone book. “It’s widely known among magicians that objects can be made to move by a surreptitious puff of breath. Just to be sure that isn’t the case here, I’d like you to try again, this time with these Styrofoam pellets surrounding the phone book.”

Hoskins stared, and his face was readable even on television: he was trapped like a fly in a spider’s web and trying not to look like it. “The pellets might absorb the psychic energy, I don’t know.”

“What if we placed a mask over your mouth and nose. Would that be fair?”

This guy was melting on his feet. “I don’t know. I need to concentrate.”

“One last offer: suppose we turned the phone book ninety degrees so that the pages are upright in relation to you and would have to be turned sideways as one would normally turn pages? In that position, it seems to me that only psychic power would be able to move them.”

Amber wiggled a finger at the screen. “He’s gone.”

Hoskins tried it with the Styrofoam pellets around the phone book, but his energy had left him. Too much interference, he said.

“So it appears you have not met the million-dollar challenge, but I thank you for trying,” said Gabriel. To the audience, “Please bid a kind adieu to Mr. Dwight Hoskins.” They applauded him off the stage. “Next up, the lovely Eloise Kramer. Don’t go away.”

Linda, the producer, came for Mandy. “All set?”

“All set,” Amber answered, swiveling Mandy’s chair around. Mandy got to her feet, her legs a little weak. In the hall behind Linda, Dwight Hoskins passed by as if looking for the nearest exit.

The .357 Magnum remained on the lamp table near the fireplace. Dane sat in the breakfast nook, winter scenery glorious outside the windows, and tapped on his computer,

Suicide Note, First Draft

By now you have found me

(delete, delete, delete)

If you haven’t found me yet, look down in Mandy’s Meadow.

Would they even know which meadow was Mandy’s Meadow?

(delete, delete, delete)

I’ve thought long and hard about this and

After giving my life due consideration

You may be wondering why I

(shift up arrow, select, delete)

Mandy’s Meadow. From where he sat he could see the meadow cloaked in a winter mantle, crisscrossed by the hoofprints of deer and elk, the lope and rest patterns of white rabbits. Shirley had talked about the wildflowers that would bloom in that meadow come springtime, the yellow fawn lilies, mountain bluebells, purple shooting stars.

The computer screen was waiting, having only four words: Suicide Note, First Draft.

He extended his hands over the keyboard—they were still in pretty good shape, no arthritis to speak of, good tendons, clear skin. Most of his body was that way. His legs were good enough to climb the stairs two, sometimes three at a time. He was watching his cholesterol, and his blood pressure was normal. His prostate … well, he couldn’t pee over a fence, but there was no cancer and he could pee well enough.

Was he getting—what did she call it—“leadbutt”? He checked and didn’t see himself sinking too deeply into his chair. He hadn’t started whining about the good old days yet—but he had started thinking about them.

You think your wife would want that … you just chucking the whole thing and turning into an old raisin? I know what she’d say: buy some testosterone, get a motorcycle, do whatever it takes to get living again, but don’t waste the years God still has for you. You believe in God? Well, give Him some credit. He might know what He’s doing.

Dane’s hands fell into his lap. He felt chastised.

He might know what He’s doing.

Well … He just might.

Delete, delete, delete.

Dane tapped on the keys,

Since when did God choose only painless lessons for His children?

He closed the file without saving it, then strode back to the lamp table by the fireplace, wrapped the gun in its plastic wrapper, and tucked it away in its original box. He still had the receipt.