Page 123 of Violent Possession
The machine hisses, chokes, and makes noises that suggest an imminent domestic catastrophe. Before I am forced to intervene as a firefighter and a homeowner, I decide to announce my presence.
“You’re going to break the machine,” I say, hoarser than usual from lack of use in the last hours.
Griffin turns, half-jumping, already in a defensive position. He didn’t hear me come in. But he immediately returns to the machine. “Do you need a fucking PhD to use this thing?” he scoffs. “Where’s the ‘make coffee’ button?”
The answer, so childishly defiant, amuses me in a way I don’t know how to process. I walk up to him, invading his personal perimeter as a deliberate test. His scent is immediate, and there’s nothing about him that matches this apartment of steel and glass: it’s the remnant of analgesic and, underneath everything, sleep. A real,truesmell. A threat to the sterility of my sanctuary.
“There isn’t a ‘make coffee’ button,” I say, touching his hand to adjust the machine’s selector. The gesture is supposedly technical, but our knuckles bump, and there’s a jolt of static electricity. “The grind needs to be exact. The machine is sensitive to pressure.”
He doesn’t back away. I have to lean over him to reach the water reservoir, my chest touching his back. I feel him hold his breath.
“Do we live together now?” he asks, testing the exact distance between provocation and disaster. “I need to know if I can leave my things scattered or if my husband is a clean freak.”
Husband. Said with all the sarcasm in the world, but said nonetheless.
I should reprimand him for his insolence. I should put the barrier back in place.
But instead, I just feel a twitch at the corner of my mouth.
I grab two cups. I pour coffee for both of us, and I feel like we’re pretending a life that never existed, thatcan neverexist. But Griffin accepts it willingly. “Make yourself at home,” I say. Our fingers brush. The same familiar static electric shock.
Only then does he really look at me. “Jeez, boss. You look like shit. Didn’t you sleep?”
The question is banal, but it displaces something inside me.
“I’m functional with little sleep. How’s your leg?”
“I’ve had worse,” he lies.
“Is the bed comfortable?”
“Hard as your fucking soul, but it’ll do,” he replies, and I almost smile.
I take a sip of coffee.
I need to go. I have three business meetings before noon.
But I hesitate.
The morning light enters through the window at a sharp angle, cutting the shadows, and I see Griffin as I have never seen anyone before: vulnerable in the clarity, less a threat than an invitation to disaster. He’s there, holding the cup of coffeeImade for him inmykitchen. The scene is so absurdly domestic that it defies all logic.
“I have a conversation with my father today,” I say. “Depending on the result, others might feel...encouragedto act.”
Griffin immediately understands. He straightens up, the muscles in his shoulders tense.
I go to one of the kitchen cabinets—one that doesn’t contain food—and open it with my fingerprint. Inside, in a foam insert, there is a Glock 26. Small, compact, easy to hide, but lethal at close range. I place it on the counter between us.
“Keep this,” I say. “Especially if you leave the apartment. Do you know how to use one of these?”
He places his cup on the counter and takes the gun without hesitation. The weight seems appropriate in his hand. He smiles at me.
“This is America. We learn to shoot before we learn our multiplication tables.”
He tries, with his left hand, to check the chamber. The movement is perfect, but the gun slips for a moment. He recovers it quickly, but gives me a defiant look, as if betting I would laugh at him.
He clears his throat, his face flushing slightly as he laughs at himself. The bravado melts away into an adorably pathetic vulnerability.
“...I swear I know how to use it.”
