Just months before I start medical school in Boston, I decide to let loose for one night. A dark club, a loud band, strong drinks--and the attention of a dangerous-looking man who says he's in the city for only a week.
I know exactly what he is: a...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
FEBRUARY 14, 1986/Camden, Maine
In this world, there are only two pure actions: love, and vengeance.
I've experienced the first only once in my long life. It was a platonic love, a brotherly love, but an intense and fulfilling love nonetheless.
The second? It's intertwined with the first, and will be executed soon.
I bury my hands in the pockets of my blue wool pea coat. Maine is frigid and snowy, so unlike my native Italy. Cold used to bother me, used to chill me to my core, but that was lifetimes ago. Now it's only a minor bother, because I'm tantalizingly close to my mark. What passes as blood in my veins simmers and mixes with my rage.
Fresh snow falls in fat, fluffy flakes, making the little historic downtown here a picture-perfect postcard—and allowing me to go outside in the daytime. Unlike others in my clan, I'm perfectly fine during the day if the sun's not high and bright, so Maine in winter is an excellent assignment for me.
There's something about this place that seems frozen in time, as if it was perpetually stuck in 1946, not 1986. Something stagnant and traditional, provincial and insular.
Today there's a local winter festival, and the streets are packed—or what passes as packed in these parts. Families laughing and eating caramel apples, young couples with feathered hair and intertwined hands, teens in roving packs wearing various shades of neon. It appears the entirety of Camden is here, walking in the middle of Main Street. Vehicles are prohibited for the afternoon, which means it's easy to get lost in the crowd.
This, combined with the gray, sunless sky, makes for perfect hunting.
My targets pause at an ice sculpture. They're about ten feet from me, and I hang back at the next booth, one that's selling postcards and lobster-themed knickknacks. While I pretend to scan the racks, my glance slides to the right.
Thomas and Gabrielle Ransom. They look like any other couple in their sixties here on the coast of Maine. He's wearing a blue fleece jacket, chino pants, duck boots. She's wearing a similar outfit but in red, and her sensible, silver bob is tamed with a matching headband. They look as though they shop frequently at L.L. Bean, where I'd stopped on my way from New York.
I'd even purchased a wool sweater and a pair of boots, figuring I'd need to look the part in this backwater if I ended up at a bar or restaurant. No Armani suits here.
Thomas leans into his wife's ear, whispering something that makes her face light up. She laughs, a sound similar to wind chimes on a breezy day, and rests her hand lightly on his chest. His smile is triumphant, as if it was his life's mission to amuse her.
Fated mates are all the same, the world over. I've seen more than a few in my time, and always found them insipid.
"Um, sir, just to let you know, those are three for a dollar."
