Lexicon

meaningful distinction between you, and you carry the knowledge that you are insufficient without her every day for twenty years, until she drives an animal transport at you, and you shoot her. It’s that.”
    Wil watched the road awhile.
    “I’m sorry I called you broken,” Eliot said.
    “Forget it.”
    “Everyone’s broken,” Eliot said, “one way or another.”
    • • •
    He slept and woke to the windshield filled with a great metal lattice. A bridge, he realized, its steel beams splashed by yellow sodium-vapor streetlights. Eliot had one arm slung over the seat and was reversing around oncoming traffic. A car swung by them, horn blaring. A motorcycle stuttered past, the driver yelling unintelligibly. They swung around a corner and Eliot turned off the Mini’s engine.
    “Traffic camera on the bridge,” said Eliot. “Almost drove through it.”
    Wil looked out at a coffee shop advertising waffles. The street was lined with tall, quaint buildings, most in pastel colors under a dusting of snow. The streetlights were trimmed with iron lacework. No people in sight. It felt late. “Where are we?”
    “Grand Forks.”
    “What are we doing?”
    “We’re waiting,” Eliot said. “Once a little time has passed, we’re going to walk across that bridge. One at a time, I think, since I may have aroused suspicion just now. On the other side, we’re going to acquire a vehicle and continue to Minneapolis. There we’ll take passport photos in subpar lighting conditions and visit the Federal Building on Third Avenue South, which is a designated passport agency, and can issue replacement passports to people who have had theirs stolen, which we will claim has occurred. We will be asked to provide documentation proving, firstly, that we’re U.S. citizens, and, secondly, that we are the people named in the first documents. This will occur in a genial, low-pressure interview, as opposed to at the front of an airport queue with an official holding out one hand for our papers, so should allow me to compromise our interviewer into accepting our mall booth passport photos. This person will then begin the process of issuing new passports in false names with our photos on them.”
    “Doesn’t that take weeks?”
    “No. It takes four hours, if you pay the expedition fee. We will then take a roundabout route to Sydney, balancing the need to arrive before our false documentation is discovered against the need to avoid airports with face-recognition technology. I’m thinking Vancouver and then Seoul, since Korean Air is a good airline for our purposes. No data sharing. Does that answer your question?”
    “Yes.” They waited. Wil yawned. A woman walked by who reminded Wil of someone but he didn’t know who.
    Eliot opened the door. “Wait ten minutes then walk directly across the bridge. Keep your head down. That’s important. No looking up for any reason. Clear?”
    “Clear,” he said. Eliot climbed out. The door went
clunk
. He watched Eliot’s beige coat disappear around the coffee shop.
    The windows fogged. The car filled with cold. He thought about Cecilia. He’d met her in a pet store. He’d walked past and doubled back and pretended to be interested in puppies. Almost bought one, even. Just because she was selling them. On their second date, he discovered she didn’t like animals much. She only liked organizing them. Deciding what they ate. She liked putting them in cages, basically. When Cecilia had started dropping marriage hints, about three months in, Wil had thought of that.
    He got out of the car. It was misty, visibility down to a few hundred feet. He stuck his hands in his pockets and started walking. Eyes down. The occasional car plumed by to his left, plowing slush. He reached the bridge and began to cross. A black river slid by below. It was a high bridge. Long, too. He hadn’t realized how long. A pickup truck made an odd note and he looked up before remembering he was not supposed to do that. About halfway across a vehicle approached from behind and slowed. He kept walking. The car’s tires crunched snow. It was keeping pace with him. He didn’t turn. He could see the far side now but no Eliot.
    The world splashed red and blue. Static barked. “Sir, stop where you are.” This was a megaphone.
    He stopped. A police cruiser rolled up to him. The door opened and a cop with a dark mustache climbed out. “Mind taking your hands out of your pockets, sir?”
    He showed his hands.
    “Sir,