Gone Girl

debatable.) But while I was gathering the guts, Amy had preempted me with her speech about still loving me (lying bitch!), and I lost my nerve. I felt likethe ultimate cheat and coward, and – the catch-22 – I craved Andie to make me feel better.
    But Andie was no longer the antidote to my nerves. Quite the opposite.
    The girl was wrapping herself around me even now, oblivious as a weed.
    ‘Look, Andie,’ I said, a big exhale, not letting her sit down, keeping her near the door. ‘You are such a special person to me. You’ve handled all this so amazingly well—’ Make her want to keep you safe .
    ‘I mean …’ Her voice wavered. ‘I feel so sorry, for Amy. Which is insane. I know I don’t even have a right to feel sad for her, or worried. And on top of feeling sad, I feel so guilty.’ She leaned her head against my chest. I retreated, held her at arm’s length so she had to look at me.
    ‘Well, that’s one thing I think we can fix. I think we need to fix,’ I said, pulling up Tanner’s exact words.
    ‘We should go to the police,’ she said. ‘I’m your alibi for that morning, we’ll just tell them.’
    ‘You’re my alibi for about an hour that morning,’ I said. ‘No one saw or heard Amy after eleven p.m. the night before. The police can say I killed her before I saw you.’
    ‘That’s disgusting.’
    I shrugged. I thought, for a second, about telling her about Amy – my wife is framing me – and quickly dismissed it. Andie couldn’t play the game on Amy’s level. She’d want to be my teammate, and she’d drag me down. Andie would be a liability going forward. I put my hands on her arms again, relaunched my speech.
    ‘Look, Andie, we are both under an amazing amount of stress and pressure, and a lot of it is brought on by our feelings of guilt. Andie, the thing is, we are good people. We were attracted to each other, I think, because we both have similar values. Of treating people right, of doing the right thing. And right now we know what we are doing is wrong.’
    Her broken, hopeful expression changed – the wet eyes, the gentle touch, they disappeared: a weird flicker, a window shade pulled down, something darker in her face.
    ‘We need to end this, Andie. I think we both know that. It’s so hard, but it’s the decent thing to do. I think it’s the advice we’d give ourselves if we could think straight. As much as I love you, I am still married to Amy. I have to do the right thing.’
    ‘And if she’s found?’ She didn’t say dead or alive .
    ‘That’s something we can discuss then.’
    ‘Then! And until then, what?’
    I shrugged helplessly: Until then, nothing .
    ‘What, Nick? I fuck off until then?’
    ‘That’s an ugly choice of words.’
    ‘But that’s what you mean.’ She smirked.
    ‘I’m sorry, Andie. I don’t think it’s right for me to be with you right now. It’s dangerous for you, it’s dangerous for me. It doesn’t sit well with my conscience. It’s just how I feel.’
    ‘Yeah? You know how I feel?’ Her eyes burst over, tears streaming down her cheeks. ‘I feel like a dumb college girl that you started fucking because you were bored with your wife and I made it extremely convenient for you. You could go home to Amy and eat dinner with her and play around in your little bar that you bought with her money, and then you could meet me at your dying dad’s house and jack off on my tits because, poor you, your mean wife would never let you do that.’
    ‘Andie, you know that’s not—’
    ‘What a shit you are. What kind of man are you?’
    ‘Andie, please.’ Contain this, Nick . ‘I think because you haven’t been able to talk about this stuff, everything has gotten a little bigger in your mind, a little—’
    ‘Fuck you. You think I’m some dumb kid, some pathetic student you can manage ? I stick by you through all this – this talk about how you might be a murderer – and as soon as it’s a little tough for you? No, no . You don’t get to talk about conscience and decency and guilt and feel like you are doing the right thing. Do you understand me? Because you are a cheating, cowardly, selfish shit .’
    She turned away from me, sobbing, sucking in loud gulps of moist air, and breathing out mewls, and I tried to stop her, I grabbed her by the arm. ‘Andie, this isn’t how I want to—’
    ‘Hands off me! Hands off me!’
    She moved toward the back door, and I could see what would happen, the hatred and embarrassment