I had several girlfriends over the years, but my inability to go public with them always eroded away at the relationship, leaving me single in the end. The one-night stands I collected were brief encounters and left me feeling only shame. June always encouraged me to come out, to force my mother to accept it, but I just couldn’t. I couldn’t bear to give her more ammunition.

June is saying something about chasing the person into the woods and them getting away in a boat. The female police officer asks June to take them there, then glances over at the male police officer to make sure she’s made the right request. I move up close to her again and say right into her ear, Don’t let the asshole intimidate you. He doesn’t know any more than you do. She turns her head in my direction and frowns before lifting a hand to her ear to brush my words away.

I don’t follow them. Instead I watch from inside the cottage as June leads them both down the path into the woods, the sight of which brings a chunk of memory floating up to the surface. It’s definitely part of the one I had the last time I was here, of West coming up the path toward me and my mother in the middle of the night.

In this bit of the memory, I’m standing at the very same window I am now, watching my mother and West disappear together into the forest with only the light of the moon to guide them. My mother is carrying a shovel; West is carrying something in his arms. I can’t see what it is, because he’s facing away from me, but I can tell by his pace and posture that it’s something heavy.

The memory has a distinct feeling to it, one that surges in me now. I stood here watching something that caused me terror. I don’t want to know what he’s carrying or where they’re going. I don’t want to know why. The resistance brings the fading on. My visits are getting shorter, the bits of memory clearer and more ominous. I wonder how much time I have before the entire memory rises up to show itself. Will it break me apart completely, send me back to the quiet for good? Whatever is going to happen, I know it won’t be long now …

JUNE

The police say that nothing was seen last night by the police boat but that they’ll have a boat go by again a few times tonight to check on things. I take them to the place on the island where I saw the tin boat leave from, and I show them the tree with the cross. The male police officer just stands there looking bored, while the female police officer asks me some questions and takes a couple of photos of the tree.