The Dark Side of the Moon (ePub)

Carolyn Black, a twenty-five year-old high school teacher trapped in an unhappy marriage, is attracted to Kevin Snyder, a sixteen-year-old student in one of her classes. Kevin is shy and reclusive and constantly plagued by thoughts of suicide. He also doesn't seem to realize that Carolyn is attracted to him, but on a cold March day, everything changes when they make love in the back seat of Carolyn's car.

Two weeks later, Carolyn discovers that Kevin is involved in drugs and has participated in a home invasion robbery. She decides to end her relationship with him, but she is afraid that he might seek revenge by revealing their secret, which would ruin her career. However, the day after she tells Kevin that she is ending their relationship, he shocks Carolyn by saying, "You might not believe this, but last night, I went up to my room, took out my gun, and flipped a coin to decide whether I should shoot myself. If it came up heads, I was going to shoot myself in the head, but it came up tails."
"So what are you going to do when you leave here?" said Carolyn.
"I'll probably go home and flip the coin again. Or maybe I won't bother with the coin because that's just another thing that's turned against me. But if I do commit suicide, the last thing I'll see before my lights go out will be your face. I know you don't want me to say things like that, but it's true."

Later that night, Carolyn changes her mind about Kevin and desperately searches for him before he has a chance to harm himself. When she finally finds him in his car behind an abandoned house, he is holding a gun to his head. And then...