His stare is on me already, that pale lettuce hue, and the faint jerk of his chin tells me we’re moving again.
Lethargy slows me down.
I blunder to my feet and drag my backpack to sling over my shoulder.
Silent, he leads the way to the staircase.
TWELVE
Darkness shrouds us through the old house, up the stairs, and down a corridor lined with creaky doors.
Samick pauses only to glance inside a room before we pass it, until he pushes open a door with loud groaning hinges.
His bootsteps lead the way inside. The sound is clackier, like the flooring has changed from rugs covering hardwood to cold, sharp tiles.
I inch my way in after him, a hand splayed in front of me in the dark.
Then I stop—and wait.
A familiar sound shooshes through the room, and it takes me a moment of concentration to place it.
Curtains.
He closes curtains.
Such a plain sound. Something I never made a note of before. But it was buried away in my brain—and the sound of it is a blow to the gut.
An echo of normalcy, of a life I’ll never get back.
My face falls, and just as it does, white beams erupt through the room.
Samick brought the torch.
The light bounces off porcelain and dusty mirrors, an assault at first, but then the light softens. It settles.
I’m standing in a bathroom.
With his back to me, Samick sets the torch down on the edge of the sink, propped up on a bar of soap.
He doesn’t need the light.
It’s entirely for my benefit.
The angle washes the light through the room, over the tub, the tiles, the towels racked against the wall, and for a moment, I take it all in, from the toothbrushes in the tumbler, the lotions and even retinol phials on the shelves, to the basket of dirty clothes in the corner.
A sock has fallen out of the basket. It sits on the floor, white and crumpled, with a soft brown stain on the sole.
Someone lived here.
Downstairs, it’s a practice. A collection of offices, and at least one is used for psychology sessions. It has a clinical-feeling waiting room, an extension-like kitchen, and a weirdly placed toilet at the back.
But upstairs, the bathroom is lived in.
Upstairs, it feels a bit more like a home.
Samick balances his bowl of mash-covered stew in one hand as he stalks for the tub.
Hope lifts inside of me.
