“Hello?”

“It’s me. Open up.” She leaned her forehead against the cold steel.

“It’s me, Mel. Open the door.” The door had a peephole and a sliding chain lock. She ran her fingers over the dents in the steel. “I just want to talk,” he said. “I’m on my way back to LA. I just wanted to say good-bye.”

She had just done her nails, and she watched them come up to the chain. He heard a small sound when her fingers touched the knob. He waited, but he didn’t hear the slide.

“I been doing a lot of thinking in the last couple days.” From the way his voice cracked, she could tell he was crying. “You don’t need me anymore. I know that. Shit, you’re on your way. I’m on my way, too. I just wanted to say good luck.”

She slid the chain out of the slide. He tried the door, but it was locked. “You gotta open it from the inside,” he said. “Mel? Open the door.” She turned the doorknob.

The force blew open the door. It knocked her on the floor between the beds. He lifted her up and threw her on the bed. She lay there, limp, expecting the worst. She wouldn’t resist. She held on to the thought of tomorrow. She didn’t want anything to get in its way. But nothing happened. She didn’t know where he was. It took her a minute to realize that he was next to her, sitting on the bed with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands.

He had left the door ajar. She rolled over and dove for it. With one hand, he caught the back of her sweater, and with the other, reached out and swatted the door. It closed with a quiet steel click. He held her by the collar like a kitten.

“You’re not going nowhere,” he said. “We gotta stick together, you and me. I’ve told you and told you and told you, but you don’t listen. You can’t just split off and go—this world will eat you alive. You don’t know that yet, because you haven’t been anywhere.”

He was breathing hard.

“For two days now, two whole days, I been riding around, visiting one motel after the other. I knew I’d find you, because we’re meant to be. You know what else I knew, though?” He chuckled in her ear. “I knew you’d sign your own name.” He was holding the collar on the sweater so tight she couldn’t get her fingers inside it. “I offered you a life, but you wouldn’t take it. You didn’t want it. But you’re no better’n me. You’re dirt. From nowhere. You’re nothing.”

“Mike,” she whispered.

“Say it,” he insisted. “‘I’m nothing.’ Say it once. Then we’ll forget this whole thing ever happened. We’ll start over.”

“I can’t breathe.”

“Say it.” He loosened the collar. “Say it.”

“Okay,” she gasped, sucking air back into her lungs.

“Say it.”