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I fit the key into the lock, but for a moment I hesitate, the metal cool and familiar beneath my fingers. Clyde stands just behind me, silent, his presence steady and unsettling all at once. The door creaks open, spilling us into the dim entryway. The scent of antiseptic, stale breath, and something deeper, faintly metallic, faintly like rotting flesh wraps around me like a noose. The living room stretches ahead, lined with faded photographs, crooked frames catching slivers of light.

“Lydia?” Janice calls from deeper in the house.

“Yes,” I answer.

Footsteps pad across the hardwood, and she appears in the hallway, jacket slung over her arm, hair pulled into a messy bun. She looks tired but kind, her eyes flicking from me to Clyde, curious.

“I was worried about you. The way you took off earlier.”

“Yeah, sorry about that.”

She nods. “I gave him his meds an hour ago. He’s resting. Breathing’s steady but… shallow tonight.”

I nod, swallowing a lump in my throat. “Thanks for staying late.”

“No problem.” Her gaze lingers on Clyde again, then back to me. “You sure you’re okay for the night?”

“I’m sure.”

Janice hesitates, then gives a small smile. “Call me if anything changes, okay?”

“I will.”

She brushes past us, her perfume light and powdery, and a moment later, the door clicks shut behind her. The house falls silent, except for the slow, mechanical rhythm of the oxygen machine.

Clyde exhales beside me, his voice soft. “He’s here?”

“In the office,” I murmur. “We have to go through there.”

Clyde doesn’t ask why. He follows as I lead him down the narrow hallway, the floorboards creaking beneath our steps. We stop at the threshold of the office.

My father lies beneath a thin blanket on the hospital bed, the metal railings pulled up tight on either side. His chest rises and falls in shallow, uneven breaths, a hollow sound rattling in his throat. His head is turned toward the window, mouth slack, skin papery and pale beneath the glow of a small reading lamp.

Clyde stands just behind me, his voice a low whisper. “I almost don’t recognize him.”

I don’t answer. I don’t need to.

Beyond the bed, the cellar door stands proud, the top edge barely visible past stacked boxes and a tangle of medical supplies.

“We have to move past him,” I say quietly. “The door’s back there.”

Clyde nods, his expression unreadable. Together, we step into the room, our footsteps muffled by the thin rug underfoot. I skirt the edge of the bed, careful not to jostle anything, my eyes flicking to the oxygen tank, the pill bottles lined neatly along the nightstand.

Clyde pauses near the head of the bed, staring down at my father’s face. “Does he know?” he whispers. “About any of this?”

“I don’t know anymore.”

My voice cracks. A tremble slips past my lips, but I force myself to hold still. To stay composed.

I’m not ready to tell him the truth. Not yet.

That my father knows because I make sure he doesn’t forget.

Because every day, I remind him, through silence, through care laced with contempt, through the things I don’t say and the way I say the things I do.

He remembers. Because I won’t let him forget. And God help me, part of me hopes it haunts him.

The handle gleams faintly beneath the lamplight. I glance back at Clyde, giving a small nod toward the door.