I could hear our footsteps slowly falling into sync, marching as one, then gradually syncing out, as we walked the sandy path of Old Faithful Trail. I finished your sentences, you guessed my thoughts, but which one of us had a longer stride?

I recalled what you told me about the State of Montana. It was allegedly the only State where it was legal to commit murder. Not exactly legal, but possible anyway. You read it on the internet, I didn't even know if it was true. To try someone for murder, a popular jury must be convened. There was a Courthouse at Mammoth Hot Springs, but not enough permanent residents in the County. A murderer would go unpunished, for lack of a proper trial. You dropped it in the conversation, we joked about it with friends. It came back to me now. I toyed with this idea.

Even if that thing about the trial was just not true, it would be very easy to make a body disappear in Yellowstone. The basins all around contained water so scalding, sometimes so acidic, it dissolved flesh and cleaned bones in no time.

But why was I thinking of all this? The house mortgage. We had insurance, of course, and if you came to pass away, the company would cover the whole amount of the credit. I would get full enjoyment of the house. A hefty sum of money, people killed for less than that. Besides, we weren't exactly a model couple. You would go too often to those dinners with colleagues, and you would come home wearing the smell of alcohol and tobacco to hide a scent of sweat and sex, which you thought I was too dumb to catch. Of course, I had a bit on the side too. To brighten my days, I took care to make discreet encounters that allowed me to forget for a few hours the masquerade of our marriage. I surrounded myself with enough precautions to know for certain that you ignored it. But I could kill to finally get the freedom I yearned for.

How could I kill you? Strangling a person required a lot of strength, and considerable time. Simply impossible. I thought back of the knife we put in our suitcase. A large pocket knife we had bought on the Riviera for 10€, with a sharp blade longer than the palm of a hand. It only took one stab in the back, near the right kidney, between the hip bone and the ribcage, with the edge up, to disable a person. Repeat frantically, remember to hit the throat to drown the cries, and the deed was done. There still remained the issue of the blood. Wash the hands and face with water from our flasks. I should have followed your example and brought a change of clothes. Anyway, this knife must have been confiscated at customs, since it was missing when you opened our luggage.

This was all downright stupid. Besides, as you told me, and to my great surprise, you were never quite alone in Yellowstone. Even though it was early morning, an old couple of hippies was walking up with us the path to Observation Point. We walked on to the ill-named Solitary Geyser, and there was sitting a family, and a group of Chinese came in. We joined the crowd at Beehive and Lion Geyser. You turned back several times to smile at me, and the sunshine stroke some new spark in your eyes. Further on, the tourists were gathering around Morning Glory Pool, waiting their turn to do a selfie. We queued.

We pursued on towards Artemisia Pool. It was around noon. The path grew steep, the noise grew dim, giving way to birdsong. As we reached Gem Pool, I wondered at this pure blue, deeper than the sky. I needed to pee. You were just back from it, and you pointed to the trees over the path. They did hide from the view, even if the path was deserted anyway. I peed white foam between the roots of a tree. That was when I noticed a few feet away a large hole with lazily bubbling water at the bottom. An uncharted basin.

I shouted my discovery to you, as I kept my eyes on the little bubbles that burst the surface, hot puffs of dry smoke wrapping themselves around me. A body thrown down here would go missing for weeks.

I didn't have the time to turn around before the first stab hit me. I didn't feel the last of the twenty seven other hits you gave me. In my back. My neck. My ribs. My shoulder. My cheek. My belly. My thigh. Hot blood bubbled up my throat, my mouth, my nose. My wrecked body rolled down the spitting billowing hole and was swallowed.