The Lesson of Her Death

did it, the air around them got real hot and stayed that way for hours; what the boys felt was proof that somewhere upwind a dozen girls had just gotten laid.
    Corde and Diane had come outside to watch what was advertised as a meteorite shower. After the threatening photo he had made an extra effort to get home early and once there stay put for the evening. He’d noticed the story about the meteorites and, after Sarah and Jamie were in bed, asked his surprised wife if she’d like to have a date in the backyard. Diane had spread the blanket down and with half a bottle of wine beside them they sat close together, fingers twined, listening to crickets and owls and feeling the hotcolds wash over them.
    The sky was clear and dominated by the near-full moon. They’d seen only one meteorite in fifteen minutes,though it had been spectacular—a long pure white streak covering half the sky. The afterimage remained in their vision long after the burning rock disintegrated.
    “Do you wish on ’em?” Diane asked.
    “I think you can. I don’t know.”
    “I don’t know what to wish for.”
    “If you decide,” Corde said, “don’t say it out loud. Meteors’re probably like birthday candles and wishbones.”
    She kissed him, gripping his lip with her teeth. They lay on the dew-moist blanket, kissing hard, sometimes brutally, for almost five minutes. His hand slipped up under her sweater and into her bra. He felt her stiffen as her nipple went instantly hard.
    “Passion,” he whispered, grinning.
    “Cold,” she said, exhaling a laugh. “I know a place where it’s warmer.”
    “So do I.” His hand started down toward her jeans.
    Diane grabbed it with both of hers. “Follow me.” She stood up and pulled him toward the house.
    “Does this have anything to do with your wish?” he asked.
    They lay in the same pose as in the yard. Now though they were naked and atop a hex-pattern quilt Diane’s mother had begun the year of the Iran embassy takeover and finished the year of the
Challenger
explosion. The three-way light was on dim and Corde had licked off the last bit of her lipstick. He rolled her over on her back.
    “Wait a minute,” she said, bounding up. “Let me put it in.”
    The promised minute passed. Then several others. He heard running water. He heard a toothbrush. He rolled over on his back, gripping himself and squeezing to keep hard.
    He heard the toilet flush. He squeezed harder.
    He heard the medicine cabinet opening and closing. He stopped squeezing; he was firm as a teenager.
    For about ten seconds.
    “Ohhhh, Bill
…”
    The heartsick cry, the alto moan of Diane’s voice, was pitiful. A scream would have been less harrowing. Corde was on his feet and running into the bathroom, thinking only when he arrived that he should have taken the time to unlock the bedside table and pull his pistol from the drawer.
    The blue diaphragm case lay at her feet. The rubber disk itself rested like a pale yellow blister on the sink.
    Diane was sobbing, her arms around herself, covering her nakedness even from her husband.
    Bill saw a small white square on the floor at her feet. He picked it up while Diane pulled her red terrycloth bathrobe off the back of the door and slipped it on, tying the belt tightly around her. “It was inside,” she whispered, spinning a stream of toilet paper off the roll and using it to pick up the diaphragm. She carried it like a crushed wasp to the wastebasket and dropped it in. She did the same with the plastic case, then began scrubbing her hands with soap and hot water.
    This Polaroid had been taken at the same time as the one left on the back steps. The scene was of Sarah, or whoever the girl might be, lying in the grass, her skirt still up to her waist. The angle was about the same, so was the lighting. There were in fact only two differences. The photographer was now much nearer—only several feet from the girl.
    And the message in red marker on the back was different. It said: GETTING CLOSER

C orde unlocked the gun rack and lifted out his long, battered Remington. He slipped three shells into the tube and from a desk drawer took a cylindrical chrome lock. He separated it and fitted the two parts on either side of the trigger guard. He squeezed them together with a soft ratchety sound. He put one key on his keychain and carried the other key and the gun itself into the living room, where Diane sat staring at the floor. Her mouth was a thin line.
    “How is