Slender frame, soft white hair, and ice blue eyes.
He has a striking resemblance to Victor Rue, the man I’ve just been googling. Same white hair and angled jaw. But what shocks me the most is his resemblance to Ed. The almond eyes, the slight nose. It’s like looking at an older Ed, everythingmirroring my brother other than the thin lips, which are like my own.
This man is the ghost of Ellison Rue.
My mum lifts her hand to reach for his, and she smiles.
“Why now? Why come to me now?” I ask.
But neither of them can answer me. My back is pressed against the wall, and I slump down to the ground, tears obscuring the vision of my dead mother and father, my world altered so drastically, questions mounting so densely that I’m drowning in them.
The thuddinginside my head startles me.
It takes me a second to notice I’m still sitting on my kitchen floor, but the sky has grown dark, grey clouds having overthrown the weak winter sun. My dead parents have vanished, and the thudding in my head is coming from my front door.
Unsure as to how long I’ve been here, I flinch at the sound of the voice coming from the other side.
“Are you in there? I suggest you open the door before I kick it in.”
Scrambling to my feet, I bolt to the door and open it before Valdemar resorts to breaking it in and alerting the entire building.
He’s out of breath. “Fuck, I thought you’d done something stupid.” He grabs my hand like he’s checking for a pulse.
It’s only then that I notice Wilson, the caretaker of the building, standing behind him.
“I couldn’t get into your building,” Valdemar explains.
“I’ll be off, then. Glad everything’s okay.” Wilson dips the brim of his baseball cap and wanders off down the hall, keys jangling on his belt.
Valdemar steps into my apartment.
“Why did you hang up the phone? I’ve been worried sick,” he says breathlessly.
“I was thinking,” comes my rather lame reply, but my head is still pounding.
“Well, you shouldn’t have been thinking alone.”
His huge frame pushes past me, and he searches the tiny foyer as if there might be intruders.
He heads to the kitchen, and I follow.
My laptop is still open, the screen black, probably from the battery dying, and my notes on Valdemar are scattered across the table.
“Working on a story?” he asks.
“Trying to find answers.”
He nods.
“They were here,” I tell him, noting the relief in my voice that I have someone to talk to, someone who knows the strange shit that goes through my head even if he doesn’t see it himself, and someone who will talk back to me.
“Who were?”
“My mother and my father.”
“Your father?” He holds my gaze as he answers his own question. “Ellison Rue is your father,” he guesses.
“Yes.”
