Til Death Do Us Part

"My condolences. Miranda was a friend of mine."

The woman in front of me is speaking as quietly as she can over the noise of the bar. Fine porcelain skin, a come-hither smile made of rosy red lipstick and full, rounded lips. I watch as the light and the darkness dance across hair that reaches her shoulders. Her figure is full, swaying to the rhythm of someone's jukebox selection.

"My wife is gone, so let's talk about you." The words roll off my tongue automatically. It's our agreed-upon code phrase.

We get drunk as skunks. I'd long since sublimated my guilt about what we do to these poor girls. I allow myself to think it's chivalry that I cover our bar tab, and I'm always careful to keep enough for cab fare. A small price to pay for any man's dream, right? A new girl every night, and always the same one.

Miranda and I leave the bar. We make enthusiastic love in this strange girl's bed, using this strange girl's body. We talk, long into the night. We make promises to each other, draw up plans, talk about ways to make the arrangement more permanent, stay silent when we both acknowledge that it won't work. In the morning I'm gone, and a teacher or secretary or corporate CEO wakes up in her bed with no memory of leaving the bar.

My wife has been dead three years. Every so often I wake up in the night, sweating, remembering the funeral. And she's always there, stroking my cheek with a stranger's hand, whispering our old familiar reassurances. Sometimes it helps.

In three years, no tunnel of light has ever come for her. No exorcists have come hunting for her. It's just us, and night after night of life together. Me in my own body, her in a rental. There's no Heaven and no Hell waiting for her, she said, when in the early months I hungrily questioned her about her existence. As I walked out of the pale, long-haired girl's condo in the predawn hours, I realized that I knew better now. Heaven can be found anywhere, but Hell is just as close.