I was reminded of the fable of the scorpion and the frog. “Why did you sting me?” the frog asks the scorpion that he is carrying across the river. “Now we’re both going to die.” And the scorpion says, “It’s my nature.”

As Pianelli ordered another beer, he twisted the knife in the wound.

“It’s a fascinating story, like a modern version of the Borgias. How much do you want to bet that Netflix will make a series out of this?”

Watching him gloat over the ruin of my family, I wanted to kill him.

“I can see why Céline dumped you,” I said. “You’re a nasty little piece of shit.”

Pianelli tried to throw his beer in my face, but I stepped smartly out of the way and lashed out with an uppercut to his chin and a punch in the belly that brought him to his knees.

As I left the bar, my enemy was down for the count, but I was the one who had lost. And this time, there was no one to protect me.

Jean-Christophe

Antibes, September 18, 2002

My dear Thomas,

After too long a silence, I am writing to you to say goodbye. Indeed, by the time this letter has crossed the Atlantic, I will have finished my earthly existence.

Before I die, I wanted to write to you one last time. I wanted to tell you again what a pleasure it was to teach you and that I have only fond memories of our long conversations and of the time we spent together. You were the most gifted student it has been my privilege to teach, Thomas. Not the most intelligent, nor the one who got the highest marks, but the most generous, the most sensitive, the most human, the most considerate in your dealings with others.

Please do not grieve for me. I have chosen my way out because I no longer have the strength to keep going. Rest assured that it is not for lack of courage but because life has visited upon me something that I cannot endure, and death now seems the only honorable way out of the hell into which I have foundered. Even books, my faithful companions, can no longer keep my head above water.

My tragedy is utterly banal, but that does not make it any less painful. For many years, I secretly loved a woman, never daring to confess my feelings lest she reject me. For a long time, the very air I breathed came from watching her live, smile, talk. Ours was a meeting of minds unlike any I have known, and the thought that my feelings might be reciprocated kept me strong in my darkest hours.

I confess that I have often reflected on your theory of the curse of the nice guys, and, naively, I hoped to disprove it, but life has not returned the favor.