A weight was bearing down on Owen: Ed leaning on him, looking over his shoulder as he knelt there in the weeds to view Phyllis. The weight on his back cancelled Owen’s impulse to bend down and kiss her lips, which had so lately kissed his, with belated passion. Ed breathed close behind his ear. “You did this, you fuckhead.”

“Did I?” Owen asked.

“She was the best woman I ever knew,” Ed said, his weight still bearing on Owen’s like a wrestler’s. “I loved her.”

“Me too. Ed, let me up. We’re both in shock, let me breathe.”

“I’ll let you breathe all right,” Ed said menacingly, but he backed off to let Owen stand. With space between them, and police listening, he told his partner, “You and I are through, buddy. The sight of you makes me puke. I was going to marry her, you know.” His upper lip did that chimp thing, as if to clean his teeth, in sheer aggression.

“No, I didn’t know. Did Phyllis know?”

This gave Ed pause. “I didn’t want to crowd her, when there was still a chance to patch it up with you. She adored you, you miserable piece of shit.”

Owen could have resented the way Ed was trying to steal his grief from him, there in front of the police, but he was thinking of a larger reality: the abyss that had yawned beside his childhood windows, the black lake of awful possibilities, had widened and risen to engulf his life. But he was still functioning, his brain still working, making more connections per split second than he could articulate, reorienting him in fresh circumstances, his perceptions quick and dry within the lake even as he drowned.

xiv. Village Wisdom