Don’t trust Hans. Should he?

“You okay, buddy?” Hans asks.

Jerry looks over at his friend. Hans is staring at him, a hardened look on his face. There’s a shift in mood in the room, a darker tone that makes him feel cold. He gets the sense Hans has been watching him for a while now.

Be careful.

“I’m fine,” he says, but he’s not fine. It’s all coming together now. Don’t trust Hans, because Hans is a psychopath.

“What are you reading?”

“Nothing much,” Jerry says, and he flicks his gaze to the arm of the couch where the gun he found earlier is resting. It’s the quickest of glances, but Hans must notice it too.

“Ah hell,” Hans says, and he picks up the gun. “Those pages, they fit into here, don’t they.” He points the gun at Jerry and shakes the journal with his other hand. “You were bound to figure it out sooner or later. Either way, it all ends here, buddy. I just needed the journal.”

“You killed Sandra,” Jerry says. “You killed the florist too.”

“You were close to figuring it out in here,” Hans says, still holding the journal, “but what I don’t understand is why you tore out those pages. What do they say?”

“You killed Sandra,” Jerry says, ignoring the question. He starts to get up from the desk. “Jesus, the girl from all those years ago! Suzan with a z. That was you as well?”

“She was the first. Don’t move any further, Jerry.”

Jerry shakes his head. He feels sick. This man has been his friend for thirty years. They’ve studied together, commiserated together, celebrated together, drunk and laughed and partied and talked all kinds of shit in all kinds of states together. His friend. His goddamn friend. “How many have there been?” he asks.

“What does it matter?” Hans asks.

“You’re insane.”

Hans shrugs. “Really? All those things you write about, and now with the Alzheimer’s messing with you, you’re calling me the insane one?”

“You’re not going to get away with this.”

Hans laughs. “Jesus, you really know how to pull out the clichés, even in the end.”

“I don’t understand,” Jerry says. “Why were you even helping me today?”

“I wasn’t planning on it,” Hans says. “I wanted to take you to the police.”

“But you changed your mind.”

“I had to, once you’d mentioned the journal. I couldn’t take the risk you’d written something in there that would come to bite me in the ass if it was ever found. And good thing too, because you had.”

Jerry thinks back to earlier this afternoon. They were only a few blocks from the police station when everything changed. That must have been when he told Hans about the journal. Everything since then has been in the pursuit of Jerry remembering where he’d hidden it.

“What about Eric? What was all that about? Did he really do those things?”

“Eric? Of course he did. He was one of your bad guys in the flesh, Jerry. A real whack job.”

Jerry looks at the gun. Then he thinks about the knife on the desk and has to make a conscious effort not to look in its direction. If he can just get to it . . .

And what? Outrun a bullet?

“So now what? You’re framing me for the bad things you’ve done too? Just like he did?”

“Hey, it was a good plan,” Hans says. “Seems a shame to waste it just because it didn’t work for him.”

“You shot Sandra.”

“I did.”

“Why can’t I remember that?”

“I drugged you,” he says. “I came over that day after you called me, and injected you when we were in the office. I had to. I knew eventually you’d figure it out. Hell, I should have known the blood on the shirt was a mistake. That’s where I messed up.”

Jerry tries to picture the moment, but there’s nothing. This man who was supposed to look out for him betrayed him. Just like Eric. “There’s no way you can get away with this,” Jerry says.

I think he’s doing just that.

Why couldn’t Henry have warned him? Doesn’t he always connect the dots?

You’re not the only one the Alzheimer’s is affecting, buddy. And I did try to warn you.

He did. But it was a little late.

“What are you going to do? Shoot me in here? Then what? The police are going to come here and they’ll figure it out.”

Hans smiles again. “All these years you kept coming to me for advice. You kept wanting to know how things work. You made shitloads of money off the help I gave you, and what did I get in return? Huh? A mention in the acknowledgments. But how about a fucking royalty check, huh? You owe me, Jerry. Think of this as me collecting, and think of this as you getting to live one of the scenarios you often gave your characters.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Your characters. You’ve put them through hell. Absolute hell. Some of the decisions they’ve had to make . . . they’re impossible . . . even for me. And now you’re going to get a taste of that. You know what your problem is, buddy? You think about yourself too much. You must think the whole universe centers on you, that you pull all the strings. But you don’t seem to pay any mind to how your actions affect anyone. Your amazing wife, your talented and beautiful daughter, your loyal friend, always at your disposal. You’d think we were all created by you. That we only exist when you’re in the room.”

Jerry thinks for second, wonders if these words could possibly be true.

“What the hell does that even mean?”

“It means your life has been over since the diagnosis, Jerry, but I’ve still got a lot of living left to do. Good living. Let’s wrap things up on good terms, huh? Good terms is a win-win for us. I get to carry on with my life, and this shitty existence of yours gets to come to an end. We end things on good terms and I don’t have to hurt Eva. Or I shoot you right now and drive to her house.”

“You son of—”

“Don’t,” Hans says, when Jerry starts to get out of the chair. “Just don’t. Not until you’ve heard me out.”

Jerry stops moving. “Don’t hurt her.”

“Then don’t make me. You write a confession, you take the easy way out, and I don’t go and—”

“Don’t say it,” Jerry says, and the images are already there, Eva crying, Eva bleeding, Eva naked and begging for her life.

“I’ll make sure she knows you’re the reason I have to hurt her. But you can save her, Jerry. Right here, right now.”

“You won’t get away with it. The police will know you did it.”

“Maybe they’ll figure it out, maybe they won’t. What is certain is Eva will be dead. You have nothing left, Jerry. But you can do this for her. You can save her.”

Jerry begins to say something then realizes he doesn’t know what. His mouth is dry. His heart is hammering again, and soon it won’t be able to hammer anymore. “You want me to shoot myself,” he says.

“It’s as simple as it sounds,” Hans says.

“I—”

“You confess to a few things on my behalf,” Hans says, “and I promise I’ll never see Eva again. You have my word. You don’t do this, and I’m going to kill her, and I’m going to have myself some fun while doing it, just like I did with the florist.”

“Have I ever killed anybody?”

“You really are a chump, Jerry. No, you haven’t, but you will be killing Eva if you don’t do what I ask.”

It doesn’t require any thought. In fact, from the moment Hans mentioned Eva’s name he knew where this was going. There is no choice. It’s what any parent would do. Die to protect their child. It comes with the territory. “What do you want me to say?”

“You’re the writer, I’m sure you can come up with something. Think of it as your greatest work of fiction.”

Jerry starts to nod. “Okay,” he says. “First I need to know what happened. That day with Sandra. I need you to tell me.”

“Why? It won’t do you any good to hear it.”

“Please. I have to know.”

Hans shrugs, like it’s no big deal. “She figured it out,” he says, “and looking through those final few pages, you almost figured it out too. In fact I think you did. That’s what’s in those loose pages, isn’t it? They’re from the diary, aren’t they?”