Maybe she should not have let him in. It just seemed so rude, though, to leave him out there. Beyond rude, it was inconceivable. But she had conceived it. Even though she couldn't possibly do anything about it, she did conceive it.
He walked right in like it was his place. For some reason, she was expecting him to be wet with rain and hesitating at the doorway. But it was a warm clear summer night and he was already sitting in his usual spot on the sofa.
"So what's up?" he asked, trying to be so very cool, and all of a sudden she had a plan. She could actually think in the presence of Max. Part one of the plan was to pour him a drink in her fine crystal.
"Oh, the good stuff," he said. "You in some kind of mood, a good mood or something?"
"Sure am," she said.
"What is it? You get promoted?"
She stood by her fake fireplace, did not move an inch closer to him.
"No," she said.
"What is it then?" Ah, she heard it. The anger, the first trace of that fury he was always holding back, the fury that thrilled her so. Fuck me with fury, baby.
"I feel good, Max. I just feel like life is good."
"What's good about it?"
"Just living is good, just breathing."
"Breathing is good?" he asked, somewhat baffled.
"Yeah. You ever try it?"
"What's so fucking good about it? It keeps me from suffocating."
"Isn't it great not to suffocate? To just open up and breathe?"
"You're fucking somebody." He stood up. Wow, he was really pissed. When she spreads her legs for him, he hardly gives a damn, but now he's interested. He's involved. He even got off his ass. But that's what her plan was for.
"No, I'm not," she replied. "Anyway, why should I wait around for you?"
"You're fucking somebody." He turned completely around, like he was pacing in place. His ears were bright red. "You little cunt!"
There it was, the peak of his anger, the danger point, a point she had been fearing from the day she met him, but at the instant she made her plan, or perhaps the instant before, it no longer seemed like such a big thing any more, and particularly so now, as it was happening. He wasn't God. He wasn't Jesus. She almost smiled, but stopped herself.
As she had always suspected, when Max reached his peak, he needed to express it with a violent act. And that is why she was not sitting on the sofa with him. She was across the room. Instead, he had this fine crystal, something he knew was important to her.
Ah, there it was, his bitter little smile, fully convinced that he just had an idea of his own, followed by the act: throwing the glass against the wall. The loudness of the smash brought her to the point of doubt. How could she possibly fit passion like this into a plan?
But her plan worked perfectly. He was done, spent. He stormed out as if he had done all the damage he could possibly do, and was escaping any possible retribution.
Standing alone by the fake fireplace, she felt awe, awe at herself. One piece of crystal and she was free of that man, because she knew that Mount Max only had one peak. She was awed that she had climbed it, that in one instant she had mapped out the entire route.
But wasn't that so mechanical? Didn't this make her like the people who don't exist, planning, programming, having goals and meeting goals? So what? If existence meant floundering around in more and more painful circles, she had had enough of it.
Her goal had been her own protection, nothing more or less than that. So she was worth something after all, at least worth thinking about.