System Erased Her From My Memory novel · Chapter 9 of 24

Chapter 9: Daylight

I didn't sleep.

I sent Delaney home in a taxi at ten and called Maia a dozen times.

Her phone went to voicemail every time.

At half past six, when the sky over the lake turned gray and then gold, I drove to the clinic.

Her car was in the lot.

The back door was unlocked.

I found her in the quiet room, asleep on the treatment table under her white jacket with her shoes on the floor.

She woke when the floor creaked.

She sat up, and her eyes were red.

"It's daylight," I said.

"I can see that."

"You said to tell you to your face. So I'm telling you."

She said nothing.

I stood in the doorway and kept my hands where she could see them.

"She came because she knew you weren't there. She knew what the second mug was for, and I didn't. I'm telling you all of it."

Maia's face didn't change.

"She kissed me, and I pulled her off." I swallowed. "Here's the worst part, and I want you to hear it from me. When she said the three sugars, my chest hurt. I don't know why. That part's real."

"Why are you telling me that?"

"Because you asked me to tell you everything. And because I didn't want you to find out later and think I'd hidden it."

She looked at the floor.

"I stood on the sidewalk," she said. "I watched you through the window for almost a minute before I came up. I told myself I'd given you plenty of time to stop her."

"You didn't see me stop her."

"I saw the part where you didn't move."

"I couldn't move. It was like being hit."

"That isn't a defense, Wes."

"I'm not defending it. I'm telling you what happened."

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