Page 59 of Kill Your Darlings

“I didn’t kill Dom.”

“Okay.So, there really was a Dom.”

He seemed weirdly matter-of-fact.Was that a cop thing?The trained reaction of someone used to hearing bizarre and alarming information?

“Dominic Baldwin.Yes.”

“Is there a Milo?”

“There was.Yes.Milo Argyros.”

“Who killed Dom?Milo?”

It was difficult to reply because I wasn’t sure he believed me, and of course this was a big part of what I’d feared all along.

“Yes.It was self-defense.”

Finn’s expression remained unreadable.“What happened?”

At the time it had all seemed black and white.Now, older and wiser, I understood how much I had assumed, how much I had taken for granted, and how other people were liable to view and judge my decisions.

As I hesitated, Finn said, “Start at the beginning.”

“Right.I’m not sure how it started.Dom and Milo were both on the football team.They were friends until senior year.But then Dom found out—or at least suspected—that Milo was gay, and he started to harass him, tried to bully him.It escalated.They got into a couple of fights at school and were nearly kicked off the team, but Dom’s father was a judge.The Baldwins were rich and influential.”

Nothing from Finn.

“Milo’s family wasn’t rich or influential, but he was our best player.Well, he and Dom were our two top players, so… Nothing happened.There were warnings.No one really made any effort to sort it out.Maybe there was no sorting it out.It went on like that and then, one night Milo phoned me and said Dom had attacked him and Milo had fought back.He was afraid he’d killed Dom and he was begging for my help.”

“Why you?Where did you fit in?”Finn asked.

“Milo and I were— He was my boyfriend.”

My first boyfriend.My first love.

Finn nodded slowly.“Got it.So, Milo phones you that he thinks he’s killed Dominic.Then what?”

“I went to the graveyard—”

“Wait.What?”

“St.Bibiana’s.There’s a historic cemetery in Steeple Hill where high school kids used to get high or just fool around.Maybe they still do.Milo would go there to drink.Dom knew that.”

“Right.You went to the cemetery and—?”

“Dominic was dead.”

“Was he?”

My eyes flashed to Finn’s.I stared at him.“Yes.I swear to God.He was dead.His head was…smashed in.”Even now, the memory shook me.“It wasn’t a rock, though.Milo said he had to grab a flower urn.He—Milo was covered in blood, too.There were marks, bruises on his neck where Dom had tried to strangle him.Itwasself-defense.Dom would have killed him.”

“That’s very possible.You weren’t there, though.You didn’t see it.This is Milo’s account of what happened.Correct?

“I could see that Milo had been fighting for his life.He was in shock.Crying.Shaking.”

It remained real and present in my memory, and yet as I related a scene I had replayed in my mind thousands, if not millions, of times, the narrative sounded flat and fake.I sounded like I was reading from a script.Ifeltlike I was reading from a script.

There was no deciphering Finn’s expression.“What happened next?”