Page 8 of We Were Liars

THAT NIGHT I had trouble sleeping.

After midnight, he called my name.

I looked out my window. Gat was lying on his back on the wooden walkway that leads to Windemere. The golden retrievers were lying near him, all five: Bosh, Grendel, Poppy, Prince Philip, and Fatima. Their tails thumped gently.

The moonlight made them all look blue.

“Come down,” he called.

I did.

Mummy’s light was out. The rest of the island was dark. We were alone, except for all the dogs.

“Scoot,” I told him. The walkway wasn’t wide. When I lay down next to him, our arms touched, mine bare and his in an olive-green hunting jacket.

We looked at the sky. So many stars, it seemed like a celebration, a grand, illicit party the galaxy was holding after the humans had been put to bed.

I was glad Gat didn’t try to sound knowledgeable about constellations or say stupid stuff about wishing on stars. But I didn’t know what to make of his silence, either.

“Can I hold your hand?” he asked.

I put mine in his.

“The universe is seeming really huge right now,” he told me. “I need something to hold on to.”

“I’m here.”

His thumb rubbed the center of my palm. All my nerves concentrated there, alive to every movement of his skin on mine. “I am not sure I’m a good person,” he said after a while.

“I’m not sure I am, either,” I said. “I’m winging it.”

“Yeah.” Gat was silent for a moment. “Do you believe in God?”

“Halfway.” I tried to think about it seriously.

I knew Gat wouldn’t settle for a flippant answer.

“When things are bad, I’ll pray or imagine someone watching over me, listening.

Like the first few days after my dad left, I thought about God.

For protection. But the rest of the time, I’m trudging along in my everyday life. It’s not even slightly spiritual.”

“I don’t believe anymore,” Gat said. “That trip to India, the poverty. No God I can imagine would let that happen. Then I came home and started noticing it on the streets of New York. People sick and starving in one of the richest nations in the world. I just—I can’t think that anyone’s watching over those people.

Which means no one is watching over me, either. ”

“That doesn’t make you a bad person.”

“My mother believes. She was raised Buddhist but goes to Methodist church now. She’s not very happy with me.” Gat hardly ever talked about his mother.

“You can’t believe just because she tells you to,” I said.

“No. The question is: how to be a good person if I don’t believe anymore.”

We stared at the sky. The dogs went into Windemere via the dog flap.

“You’re cold,” Gat said. “Let me give you my jacket.”

I wasn’t cold but I sat up. He sat up, too. Unbuttoned his olive hunting jacket and shrugged it off. Handed it to me.

It was warm from his body. Much too wide across the shoulders. His arms were bare now.

I wanted to kiss him there while I was wearing his hunting jacket. But I didn’t.

Maybe he loved Raquel. Those photos on his phone. That dried beach rose in an envelope.