I could hear him breaking free, bursting out of his cell—howling like a demon. He wouldn’t stop screaming—it was a horrifying, terrifying scream.
I wished he would stop screaming.
And then I realized it wasn’t the kid screaming.
It was me.
Lana had turned around and was staring at me, alarmed. Her eyes widened as I took the shotgun out from behind my back.
I aimed it at her.
Before anyone could stop me, I pulled the trigger.
I fired three times.
* * *
And that, my friend, concludes the sad story of how I came to murder Lana Farrar.
Epilogue
I had a visitor the other day.
I don’t get many visitors, you know. So it was nice to see a familiar face.
It was my old therapist. Mariana.
She had come to visit a colleague here—but thought she’d kill two birds with one stone; and she popped in to see me, too. Which lessened the compliment somewhat—but there you go. These days, I must take what I can get.
Mariana looked well, considering. Her husband died a few years ago, and she was heartbroken. Apparently, she completely fell apart. I know how that feels.
“How are you?” I said.
“I’m okay.” Mariana smiled cautiously. “Surviving. And you? How are you finding it here?”
I shrugged and answered with the usual banalities about making the best of things, that nothing lasts forever. “Plenty of time to think. Too much, perhaps.”
Mariana nodded. “And how are you doing with it all?”
I smiled but didn’t reply. What could I possibly say? How could I begin to tell her the truth?
As if reading my thoughts, Mariana said, “Have you considered writing it down? Everything that happened on the island?”
“No. I can’t do that.”
“Why not? It might help. To tell the story.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“You don’t sound very enthusiastic.”
“Mariana”—I smiled—“I am a professional writer, you know.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning I only write for an audience. There’s no point, otherwise.”
Mariana looked amused. “Do you really believe that, Elliot? There’s no point without an audience?” She smiled, as something occurred to her. “That reminds me of something Winnicott said—about the ‘true self.’ He said it is only accessed through play.”
I misunderstood what Mariana meant, and my ears pricked up.
“A play? Really?”
“Not a play.” Mariana shook her head. “To play. The verb.”
“Oh, I see,” I said, losing interest.
“He meant our true self only appears when there is no one to perform to—no audience, no applause. No expectation to be met. Playing serves no practical purpose, I suppose, and requires no reward. It is its own reward.”
“I see.”
“Don’t write your story for an audience, Elliot. Write it for yourself.” Mariana gave me an encouraging look. “Write it for the kid.”
I smiled politely. “I’ll think about it.”
Before she left, Mariana suggested I might find it helpful to talk to her colleague, whom she had come here to visit. “You should say hello to him, at least. You’ll like him, I’m sure. He’s very easy to talk to. It might help.”
“Perhaps I will.” I smiled. “I could certainly use someone to talk to.”
“Good.” She looked pleased. “His name’s Theo.”
“Theo. Is he a therapist here?”
“No.” Mariana hesitated. For a split second, she looked embarrassed. “He’s an inmate, like you.”
* * *
As a writer, I am habitually prone to fleeing reality. To making things up and telling stories.
Mariana once asked me about this, in a therapy session. She asked why I spent my life making things up. Why write? Why be creative?
I felt surprised she needed to ask. To me, the answer was painfully obvious. I was creative because, when I was a child, I was dissatisfied with the reality I was forced to endure. So, in my imagination, I created a new one.
That’s where all creativity is born, I believe—in the desire to escape.
Bearing that in mind, I took Mariana’s advice. If I wrote my story down, it might set me free. As she advised, I didn’t write it for publication—or performance. I wrote it for myself.
Well, perhaps that’s not quite true.
You see, when I first sat down, at the narrow desk in my cell, to write, I felt a strange, dissociated anxiety. Once, I would have ignored it—lit a cigarette or had another coffee or a drink to distract myself.