Wallace shrugged. “Perhaps you could give me a tour of your bedroom.”
“You’ve seen it before.”
“Yes,” Wallace said. “But that was when I was wearing clothes. I expect it’ll be different if we got rid of—” He yelped when the world tilted as Hugo lifted him up, throwing him over his shoulder. He was stronger than he looked. “Oh my god. Hugo, put me down!” He beat his hands against Hugo’s back, laughing as he did so.
“Never,” Hugo said. “Never, ever, ever.”
Wallace raised his head and looked up at the door as Hugo headed for the stairs. For a brief moment, he saw the flowers and leaves growing along the wood. “Thank you,” he whispered.
But the door was just that: a door.
It didn’t respond.
It would, one day. It waited for all of them.
* * *
The tour of Hugo’s bedroom went smashingly. It really was better without clothing.
EPILOGUE
On an evening in the middle of summer, Nelson Freeman said, “I think it’s time.”
Wallace looked up. He was washing the counter after another day manning the register of Charon’s Crossing Tea and Treats. Hugo and Mei were in the kitchen, getting their prep done for the following morning. It was good work, hard work. He was tired more than he wasn’t, but he went to bed every night with a sense of accomplishment.
It certainly didn’t hurt that he and Hugo worked as well together as they did. After the Manager had left, and once the fiery shine of living had faded slightly, Wallace worried that it was too much too soon. It was one thing having a ghost living in your home. It was something else entirely to have them made flesh and blood and sharing a bed. He’d thought about moving somewhere in town to give them some space or, at the very least, to another room in the house.
Nancy had decided to move back to where she’d come from, and her apartment had become available. She’d come to say goodbye, hugging Hugo before she left. She looked … brighter, somehow. She wasn’t healed, and probably wouldn’t be for a long time, if ever, but life was slowly returning to her. She told Hugo, “I’m starting again. I don’t know if I’ll ever come back. But I won’t forget what happened here.”
And with that, she left.
Hugo had shot down the idea of Wallace taking her apartment over with a grumpy expression, arms folded. “You can stay here.”
“You don’t think it’s too soon?”
He shook his head. “We’ve got the hard part out of the way, Wallace. I want you here.” He frowned, looking unsure. “Unless you want to leave.”
“No, no,” Wallace said hastily. “I rather like where I’m at.”
Hugo grinned at him. “Do you? And what exactly do you like about it?”
Wallace blushed, mumbling under his breath how cocky Hugo had become.
And that was the last time he’d mentioned it.
Shortly after his resurrection （a word he tried not to think too much about）， he had Hugo call his former law firm. At first, no one would listen, but Hugo was persistent, Wallace feeding him the right words to say. Wallace had made an awful mistake, and Patricia Ryan should be rehired immediately, her daughter’s scholarship restored. It took nearly a week for Hugo to get one of the partners on the phone—Worthington—and when Hugo told him why he was calling, Worthington said, “Wallace wanted this? Wallace Price? Are you sure? He was the one who fired her. And if you knew Wallace, you know he never admitted to mistakes.”
“He did this time,” Hugo said. “Before he died, he sent me a handwritten letter. I didn’t receive it until a few days ago.”
“Post office,” Worthington said. “Always running behind.” Silence. Then, “You’re not having me on, right? This isn’t some joke from beyond the grave that Wallace wanted you to pull?” He snorted. “Never mind, that can’t be it. Wallace didn’t know how to joke.”
Wallace muttered under his breath about the ridiculousness of lawyers.
“I can send you the letter,” Hugo said. “You can verify his handwriting. He’s very clear about wanting Mrs. Ryan to have her job back.”
Sweat trickled down the back of Wallace’s neck as he waited, staring down at the phone on the counter.
Worthington sighed. “I never thought she deserved what happened to her. She was good. More than, even. I’ve actually been thinking about calling her and…” He paused. “Tell you what: send me what you have, and I’ll take a look at it and go from there. If she wants to come back to work with us, then we’d be glad to have her.”
“Thank you,” Hugo said as Wallace cheered silently. “I appreciate that. I know Wallace would—”
“How did you know Wallace?” Worthington asked.
Wallace froze.
Hugo did not. He looked at Wallace as he said, “I loved him. I love him still.”
“Oh,” Worthington said. “That’s—I’m sorry for your loss. I didn’t know he … had someone.”
“He does,” Hugo said simply.
Worthington disconnected, and Wallace hugged Hugo as hard as he could. “Thank you,” he whispered into Hugo’s shoulder. “Thank you.”
* * *
It wasn’t easy. Of course it wasn’t. Wallace was learning how to live again, an adjustment that proved harder than he expected. He still made mistakes. But he wasn’t like he’d been before his heart had stopped.
They argued, sometimes, but it was always small, and they didn’t leave things unsaid. They were making it work. Wallace was sure they always would.
And it wasn’t as if they were in each other’s back pockets all the time. They all had jobs to do. Mei took on her role as Wallace’s trainer with gusto. She was quick to point out when he messed up, but never held it against him. She worked him hard but only because she knew what he was capable of. “One day,” she told him, “you’ll be doing this on your own. You gotta believe in yourself, man. I know I do.”
It was more than he expected. He never thought about death until he died. And now that he’d returned, he sometimes struggled with the bigger picture, the point of it all. But he had Mei and Nelson and Apollo to fall back on when things got confusing. And Hugo, of course. Always Hugo.
The Manager had returned a week after bringing Wallace back to life. And with him came their second Husk, a woman with black teeth and a vacant stare. Wallace frowned at the sight of her, but he wasn’t afraid.
“Do what you will,” the Manager said, offering no further assistance. He sat in a chair, munching on a plate of leftover scones.
“You’re not going to help?” Wallace asked.
The Manager shook his head. “Why should I? A successful manager knows how to delegate. You figure it out.”
They did, eventually, because of Mei. As the Manager looked on, she stood in front of the Husk. She took her hand. Mei grimaced, and if it was anything like it’d been with Cameron, Wallace knew she was seeing flashes of the woman’s life, all the choices she’d made that had led to her becoming as she was. By the time she let the woman go, she was crying. Hugo reached for her, but Mei shook her head. “It’s all right,” she said weakly. “It’s just … a lot. All at once.” She wiped her eyes. “I know how to help her. It’s like it was with Wallace and Cameron. Hugo, it’s up to you.”