“For what?”
“Anything,” Hugo said. “Anything to show her that those we love are never truly gone. She’s lost, and all I can do is be there for her when she finds her voice again. I owe her that much. I’ll never push her. I’ll never force her into something she’s not ready for. How could I? I already failed her once. I don’t want that to happen again.”
“It wasn’t you. You didn’t—”
“It was,” Hugo snapped at him, and Wallace could barely keep from flinching. “I could have done more. I should have done more.”
“How?” Wallace asked. “What more could you have possibly done?” Before Hugo could retort, Wallace continued. “You didn’t force Lea through the door. You didn’t cause her death. You were here when she needed you most, and now you’re doing the same for her mother. What more can you give, Hugo?”
Hugo sagged against the railing. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out.
Without thinking, Wallace reached for him again, wanting to reassure him.
His hand went right through Hugo’s shoulder.
He pulled away, face pinched. “I’m not really here,” he whispered.
“You are, Wallace.”
Three words, and Wallace wasn’t sure he’d ever heard anything more profound. “Am I?”
“Yes.”
“What does that mean?”
“I can’t tell you that,” Hugo said. “I wish I could. All I can do is show you the path before you, and help you make your own decisions.”
“What if I make the wrong one?”
“Then we start again,” Hugo said. “And hope for the best.”
Wallace snorted. “There’s that faith thing again.”
Hugo laughed, looking surprised as he did so. “Yeah, I guess so. You’re an odd man, Wallace Price.”
A flash of memory. Of calling Mei strange. “That might be the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.”
“Is it? I’ll keep that in mind.” His smile faded. “It’s going to be hard. When you leave.”
Wallace swallowed thickly. “Why?”
“Because you’re my friend,” Hugo said, as if it were the easiest thing in the world. No one had ever said that to Wallace before, and he was devastated by it. Here, at the end, he’d found a friend. “You…”
He remembered what Nelson had told him. “Fit.”
“Yeah,” Hugo said. “You fit. I didn’t expect that.”
And because he could, he said, “You should have unexpected it.”
Hugo laughed again, and they stood side by side, watching the tea plants sway back and forth.
* * *
The house was quiet.
Wallace sat on the floor.
He stared at the dying embers in the fireplace, Apollo’s head in his lap. He rubbed the dog’s ears absentmindedly, lost in thought.
He wasn’t aware he was going to speak until he did. “I never got to grow old.”
“No,” Nelson said from his chair. “I don’t suppose you did. And if you’d like, I can tell you that it’s not so great, that all the aches and pains are terrible and that I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, but that’d be a lie.”
“I wouldn’t like that.”
“I didn’t think you would.” Nelson tapped Wallace’s shoulder with his cane. “Do you wish you had?”
And wasn’t that a conundrum? “Not as I was.”
“How were you?”
“Not good,” Wallace muttered. He looked down at his hands in his lap. “I was cruel and selfish. I didn’t care about anything but myself. It’s bullshit.”
“What is?”
“This,” Wallace said, tempering his frustration. “Seeing how I was, knowing that there’s nothing I can do to change it.”
“What would you do if you could?”
And wasn’t that the crux of it? A question where any answer would serve only to show that he’d failed at almost every aspect of his life. And for what? In the end, what had it gotten him? Fancy suits and an impressive office? People who did whatever he told them the moment he said it? Jump, he’d say, and they’d do just that. Not because of any allegiance to him, but out of fear of reprisal, of what he’d do if they failed him.
They were afraid of him. And he’d used that fear against them because it was easier than turning it on himself, shining a light on all his dark places. Fear was a powerful motivator, and now, now, now, he knew fear. He was afraid of so many things, but particularly the unknown.
It was this thought that made Wallace push himself up off the floor, suddenly determined. His hands were shaking, skin prickling, but he didn’t stop.
Nelson squinted up at him. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to see the door.”
Nelson’s eyes bulged as he struggled to rise from his chair. “What? Wait, Wallace, no, you don’t want to do that. Not until Hugo is there with you.”
He shook his head. “I’m not going through. I just want to see it.”
That didn’t calm Nelson down. He grunted as he stood, using the cane to pull himself up. “That’s not the point, boy. You need to be careful. Think, Wallace. Harder than you ever have in your life.”
He looked toward the stairs. “I am.”
* * *
He walked up the stairs, Nelson grumbling behind him. They paused on the second floor, the walls a pale yellow, the wooden floors silent underneath their feet, watching as Apollo walked down the hall toward a closed vibrant green door at the end. He walked through the door, tail wagging before it disappeared.
“Hugo’s room,” Nelson said.
Wallace knew that already, though he hadn’t been inside. At the other end of the hall was Mei’s room, the white door also closed, a sign hanging crooked on it that read: REMEMBER TO MAKE IT A GREAT DAY. The first day when he’d gone there and woken her up was the only time he’d been to the second floor.
He thought about going back downstairs, waiting for the alarm clocks to go off and another day to start.
He turned …
… and went up the stairs to the third floor.
The hook in his chest vibrated as he climbed each step. It felt almost hot, and if he focused hard enough, he thought he could hear whispers coming from the air around him.
He understood, then, that it wasn’t from Hugo like he’d first thought. Not just from Hugo, at least. Oh, Wallace was sure Hugo was part of it, as were Mei and Nelson and Apollo and this strange house. But there was more to it, something much grander than he expected. The air around him filled with whispers, almost like a song he couldn’t quite make out. It was calling for him, urging him upward. He blinked rapidly against the sting in his eyes, wondering if Lea had been able to hear any of this as she was pulled toward the door, fighting against the strong grip around her wrist.
He panted as he reached the landing on the third floor. To his right, an open loft, moonlight streaming in through the only window. A row of shelves lined the wall, filled with hundreds of books. Plants hung from the ceiling, their blooms gold and blue and yellow and pink.
To his left, a hallway with closed doors. Pictures hung on the walls: sunsets on white beaches, snow falling in thick clumps in an old forest, a church covered in moss with one stained glass window still intact.