“It’s hard to get anything into the Bystander these days,” I added, “unless it’s about the Middle East.”

“You’re probably right,” he said with a bright, false smile.

By the time dinner was over and the dishes were soaking in the sink, night had fallen and I felt pretty drunk. We sat on the couch, its white leather sticking to my leg, while jazz drifted through the room, and I recall thinking to myself that I didn’t really feel like working anymore. My whole reason for being here seemed long submerged.

Still, I asked, as he emptied the bottle into my glass, “What were these thoughts you had about the story?”

Lane set the bottle down, then shifted a little closer on the couch. He drew a deep breath and said, “No thoughts.”

“No thoughts.”

“Nothing.” He was smiling. “I just wanted you to come over tonight.”

In the instant of my confusion, he grabbed me by my biceps, butted his mouth into mine, and sucked. He made hot, almost panicked noises, and when he came up for air, he said, “I’m in love with you, Whitney,” then climbed on top of me, his firm dick poking through his jeans.

“Get off—” I gasped. “Lane—”

Now he was pressing on his dick like he wanted to take it out and play with it.

I freed an arm and punched him in the padded ribs. He coughed and I wriggled off the couch. I touched my face where he’d grabbed it. Some of the scabs had opened and I was bleeding.

Lane stared up at me, confused, and it was the hypocrisy of his confusion that enraged me. How brutally harsh did you need to be to a man?

I’d later doubt the wisdom of all the things I shouted at him then. “You really think I find you attractive? How many signals have I sent you? How blind are you, actually?”

He sprawled on the couch, disheveled and squinting, as though he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“I love you,” he said, as if it couldn’t be refuted.

As I pulled on my shoes, I said his feelings didn’t matter, and in a moment of terrible change, something burned behind his eyes.

THE WEST

1.

“What happened that last year?”

I’m startled to attention. The girl from Vice and I are coming to the end of the interview, and I realize I’ve been answering automatically, reaching for the nearest canned phrase as I watch the fading daylight cut across a neighboring tower. I wonder if she sees how the question interests me, if she can sense the weight atop my story, muting it.

“What do you mean?”

She opens The Complete Bystander and says, “In the introduction, Gordon Stone writes about the magazine’s unraveling.”

“Right.” I settle back in my chair.

“Can you talk a bit about that?”