Sliver Of Truth

“Stop running, you coward!” I yell into the huge darkness. My voice resonates in the deserted space. “Let me see your face.”

My voice bounces off the surfaces around me again. I don’t sound scared and heartbroken, but I am. I sound strong and sure. I take the gun from the waist of my jeans. The metal is warm from my skin. In my hand, it feels solid and righteous. This is the second time in my life I’ve held a gun with the intent to use it. I don’t like it any better than the first time, but I’m more confident now, know that I can fire if pressed.

He steps out from the shadows, seems to move silently, to glide like the ghost that he is. I take a step toward him and then stop, raise my gun. I still can’t see his face. A milky light has started to shine through the gaping holes in the ceiling as the moon moves through a break in the cloud cover. Shapes emerge in the darkness. He starts moving toward me slowly. I stand my ground but the gun starts shaking in my hand.

“Ridley, don’t do it. You’ll never be able to live with it.”

The voice comes from behind me and I spin around to see someone I didn’t expect to see again.

“This is none of your business,” I yell, and turn back to the man I’ve been chasing.

“Ridley, don’t be stupid. Put that gun down.” This voice behind me sounds desperate, cracks with emotion. “You know I can’t let you kill him.”

My heart rate responds to the fear in his voice. What am I doing? Adrenaline is making my mouth dry, the back of my neck tingle. I can’t fire but I can’t lower the gun, either. I have the urge to scream in my fear and anger, my frustration and confusion, but it all lodges in my throat.

When he’s finally close enough to see, I gaze upon his face. And he’s someone I don’t recognize at all. I draw in a gasp as a wide, cruel smile spreads across his face. And then I get it. He is the man they say he is.

“Oh, God,” I say, lowering my gun. “Oh, no.”

2

I bet you thought you’d heard the end of me. You might have at least hoped that I’d had my fill of drama for one lifetime and that the road ahead of me would not hold any more surprises, that things would go pretty smoothly from now on. Believe me, I thought so, too. We were both wrong.

About a year ago, a series of mundane events and ordinary decisions led my life to connect with the life of a toddler by the name of Justin Wheeler. I happened to be standing across the street from him on a cool autumn morning as he wandered into the path of an oncoming van. In an unthinking moment, I leapt out into the street, grabbed him, and dove us both out of the way of the vehicle that certainly would have killed him…and maybe me if I’d been thirty seconds earlier or later arriving on the scene. Still, that might have been the end of it, a heroic deed remembered only by Justin Wheeler, his family, and me, except for the fact that a Post photographer standing on the corner got the whole thing on film. That photograph (a pretty amazing action shot, if I do say so myself) led to another series of events that would force me to question virtually everything about my former perfect life and ultimately cause it to unravel in the most horrible ways.

The funny thing was, even after my life had dissolved around me, even after everything I thought defined me had turned out to be a lie, I found that I was still me. I still had the strength to move forward into the unknown. And that was a pretty cool thing to learn about myself.

My life may have looked as if it had been on the business end of a wrecking ball, but Ridley Jones still emerged from the remains. And though there were times when I didn’t think it was possible, my life settled back into a somewhat normal rhythm. For a while, anyway.

If you don’t know what happened to me and how it all turned out, you could go back now and find out before you move ahead. I’m not saying the things that follow won’t make any sense to you or that you won’t get anything out of the experience of joining me on this next chapter of my vida loca. What I’m saying is that it’s kind of like sleeping with someone before you know her name. But maybe you like it like that. Maybe you want to come along and figure things out as we go, like any new relationship, I guess. Either way, the choice is yours. The choice is always yours.

Well, I’ll get to it, then.

I’m the last person in the world without a digital camera. I don’t like them; they seem too fragile. As if getting caught in the rain or clumsily pushing the wrong button could erase some of your memories. I have a 35-millimeter Minolta that I’ve been using since college. I take my rolls of film and then drop them off at the same photo lab on Second Avenue I’ve been using for years.