I had to get control of the situation long enough to find the phone, whatever Stefan thought he knew, whatever I thought I knew. And what if she was dangerous? What if I went upstairs to get my phone off the nightstand and came back to find Stefan with a kitchen knife in his ribs? Why didn’t I have some of those zip ties that criminals always seemed to keep at hand?

“I’m sorry, Stefan. I’m so sorry. I loved her so much...”

“And she loved me, you sick psycho!”

I had never seen Stefan like this, stupid with rage, tears and snot coursing down his red face.

“She did love you. She never loved me the way she loved you.” Esme straightened her spine. “I wrecked your life, Stefan. And I wrecked hers. It was my fault. If there was anything I could do to change it, I would do it. I wouldn’t care what happened to me.”

Stefan swung out of his chair and Esme half rose, I put my hand on her arm and she sat back down. I heard Stefan swear as he slipped and went down hard...why is there water all over the floor? From the kitchen, I could hear the sounds of Stefan filling a glass with ice and water, then unspooling paper towel to clean up the spill from the electric kettle.

“Are you hurt?” I said. “Are you burned?”

She said simply, “Yes.” She raised the hem of the hoodie and the pink tee shirt beneath it, to reveal an ugly mountain range of welted red flesh. She said, “I really only wanted to talk to you before I left, and I was just going to knock on the door. But it was the middle of the night and so I thought I’d just sit on one of the lawn chairs and wait until it got light. But I was freezing cold.”

Stefan came back into the room. “So what do you want with us? That you keep following my mother and breaking into our house?”

“I need to go upstairs and get my phone,” I told Stefan. I mouthed, call nine-one-one. But he didn’t seem to understand what I was saying. “Okay. I’ll wait here and watch her.”