If.
Third floor. Left at the landing. The door with the crooked 3B that Pickle was meaning to fix.
I knocked.
The sound echoed in the hallway—flat, hollow. No footsteps inside. No crash of Pickle tripping over his gear bag on his way to answer. No muffled swearing or shouts ofone second!
I knocked again. Harder.
"Pickle?"
I pressed my ear to the door. Listened.
The door across the hall opened a crack. An older man peered out, suspicion etched into every wrinkle.
"He's not home," the man said. "Left last night. Heard him on the stairs."
"Did he say where he was going?"
The man's eyes narrowed. "You the camera fellow?"
I didn't know how to answer that. "I'm a friend."
"Mmm. Haven't seen him since. Usually hear him, though. Kid's not quiet."
No. He wasn't. Pickle existed at full volume. Even when he tried to be still, energy leaked from him. Bouncing knees. Tapping fingers. The constant low-grade hum of a mind that never stopped moving.
"Thanks," I told the neighbor. He grunted and closed his door.
I stood in the hallway staring at the crooked numbers on Pickle's door.
Left last night.
Probably left shortly after returning from the arena. He didn't sleep in his apartment last night.
He'd gone somewhere else. Somewhere that wasn't me or an apartment full of memories he couldn't escape.
Jake and Evan's, probably. I pulled out my phone. Stared at the screen.
I could text him.I'm at your apartment. Where are you? We need to talk.
That was pressure.
The staircase felt longer on the way back down. Each stair creaked under my weight. The woman with the stroller was gone.
I pushed through the front door into the cold.
Pickle was out there somewhere. Processing. Hurting. Deciding whether I was worth another chance.
My phone buzzed.
I grabbed it so fast I nearly dropped it.
Not Pickle.
Hog.
I answered before the second ring finished.
