The Final Confrontation — Part 1
For a few seconds, I forgot where I was. That possibility echoed through my mind.
The moment I die, the evidence takes effect.
Wind blew in through the window, coolness washing across my face.
From downstairs, faint and intermittent, came shouts.
Detective Vance had arrived. She was down there screaming her lungs out: "Ian Ashford, you goddamn bastard!"
I regained some measure of reason.
I said, "Looks like I won."
Dr. Ashmore smiled and said, "Indeed—if she makes it up to this office alive."
Bastard!
I pulled out my phone, turned off airplane mode, and called Detective Vance as fast as I could.
She was shouting on the other end.
I said, "He hasn't done anything."
Dr. Ashmore chimed in, "Officer Vance, I'm perfectly fine."
Detective Vance wanted to come up.
I said, "Wait for me downstairs."
She said, "No."
I said, "You promised to trust me."
She said, "But—"
I said, "I'm begging you."
My voice was nearly a plea.
Detective Vance hesitated, then finally agreed.
Dr. Ashmore studied me the way one studies prey.
He had placed me in a maze.
Retreat meant his acquittal.
Waiting meant Detective Vance's death.
The only exit he'd left led straight to my own death.
I couldn't see any other path.
And still he pressed harder.
"She'll lose patience soon enough. She'll come up to find you." Dr. Ashmore spoke slowly.
I made myself breathe deeply, forced myself to keep thinking.
I said, "Even if I die, you'll still find a way to beat the charges."
He didn't deny it.
He said, "It'd be a lie to say I wouldn't try. But with the evidence you're holding, my struggling would be meaningless."
I said, "You're someone with a risk-averse perfectionism."
He said, "Who knows? Maybe facing a worthy opponent has given me a bigger appetite."
He paused, then suddenly lifted his gaze. "Did you love Serena?"
What kind of question was that?
I said, "I've always loved her…"
He said, "Since when?"
I paused. Time was something I'd never considered. Serena had never asked when I began loving her, either.
Unbidden, the afternoon of our first meeting surfaced in my mind.
That afternoon, heavy snow was falling. She stepped out from a covered pavilion.
It was cold. She hugged herself and blew a warm breath into her cupped hands.
She tilted her head back. Between sky and earth, everything was white.
She gazed at the clouds above and whispered, "Mama."
I stood behind her, holding that lukewarm rice ball in my hands. From somewhere deep within me rose the conviction that she needed someone to protect her.
From the moment I first decided to protect her, I knew I had fallen in love with her.
Dr. Ashmore said, "She's already dead."
In an instant, the heavy snow, the pavilion—everything vanished.
I stood rooted before him, with only the dark night and the rain drumming into the room.
Dr. Ashmore's lips curled upward. "She died in despair."
A hum rang in my skull.
It was as if a balloon had been punctured inside my brain.
Flying out with the explosion came fragments of the days after Serena and I were together. I couldn't quite remember what those days were anymore.
Sunlight spilling into the bedroom. She hesitated, asking if we could get a cat.
The fluorescent tube flickered twice, and the living room light came on.
She sat beside the locked floor-to-ceiling window, quietly gazing at the clouds and mist beyond the balcony.
In her arms she held a small kitten just brought home, staring off in a trance. Her eyes were like that kitten's—sitting in a home where she wouldn't wake up one day and lose everything.
And then that weekend I couldn't place in time.
I woke in the early morning, Serena still dreaming beside me.
Wind pushed through the unlatched window. Rain crept in along the curtains, damp and dripping.
I closed the window and heard Serena roll over behind me.
She said, "Don't close it."
That was her second day at a new job. The pay wasn't much, but enough to support herself. I'd disagreed at first—a nine-to-five grind was too exhausting, maybe she could stay home, run an online shop or something, and not take grief from outsiders.
But she told me it was a kind of freedom.
That day I sat beside her and heard her say, "Ian, thank you."
"Thank you for what?"
"It's been five years since I've had wounds on my body."
She held me tight and said, "I'm free."
She was no longer that little girl who needed to lock every door and window to feel safe.
Yet on that day, much later, she locked the floor-to-ceiling window, scattered thumbtacks across the balcony, and became that trembling little girl once again.
Became that little girl who couldn't even protect herself.
Even the lover she'd finally found became the last one to push her off the cliff.
I couldn't know what kind of despair she endured that day.
All I knew was who caused it all.
For so long, I'd wondered.
Why they gave me this left eye.
As if offering me hope.
Yet everywhere I looked, there was nothing but despair.
Now I finally had my answer.
Every ounce of pain you inflicted on her,
I will repay in full.
I grabbed the knife.
The blade slid from its sheath, tracing across my left eye.
I forced my left eye wide open. Wind poured in from the window, biting into the wound.
From the depths of the nerve came an anguish that howled like a beast.
I stood. Blood ran slowly from my socket, washing over the entire eyeball as swirling blackness pulsed within. In my left eye was reflected Dr. Ashmore's panicked face.
He said, "Who exactly are you?"
I said, "I'm Serena's beloved."
He said, "That doesn't matter."
I paused, then said, "It matters more than anything."
---
Dr. Ashmore retreated to the window.
He said, "No—your eye can't do anything."
He was right. At this moment, there was no one behind him.
But I'd already gotten what I needed.
While I advanced on him, he hadn't noticed that I'd been observing the frames on the bookcase the entire time.
Finally, from a particular angle, I saw the frame in full.
It was a black-and-white photograph.
I remembered that day at the orphanage, when confronted with questions, Dr. Ashmore had pulled out two dry certificates from a storage room full of photographs.
Even then I'd wondered—why certificates and not a wedding photo?
Perhaps it was Serena's last act of defiance, refusing to wear that unwanted wedding gown.
But if he kept claiming he loved her, why wouldn't he display his own childhood photo alongside hers?
To serve as their wedding portrait.
Dr. Ashmore fumbled for his phone, trying to make a call.
Behind him, shadowy figures began to take shape.
Not enough—I needed them clearer.
In Dr. Ashmore's field of vision, a hand appeared—my hand—gently pressing the power button on his phone.
The tip of the blade pressed against his throat.
I said softly, "Qiao, the rain is still falling. Let's have ourselves a proper chat."
I watched as the shadows behind him grew sharper and more distinct.