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  “What does this mean, Ivory? I thought I was Isaac. Am I not Isaac?”

  I don’t know what he’s saying. I don’t know where he is. He seems to be in front of me, and then behind me, and then all around me, and I feel like I cannot breathe myself or see myself or be anything but in a swirling darkness that makes no sense for the world I’ve been in.

  “What does this mean, Ivory? I thought I was Isaac.”

  “Y – you are.”

  “Then why does it say another name?”

  I’m trying to get to my feet, but the floor is slipping and disappearing behind my every movement. I can’t see through a veil of shock and confusion and loss, but I’m trying, and fighting, against my own mind, against the horror that he’s starting to weigh down into my very core.

  “Why does it say another name? I thought I was Isaac.”

  “I – don’t – know who you are – !” It comes out choked, constricted, as if his fingers had been wrapped around my throat, and I finally raise myself to quivering feet and start moving away from him. Adrenaline, confusion, and fear makes me stumble, but once my feet hit the ground, it’s all I can do from taking off at a breakneck speed away from the boy who proclaimed himself to be my brother at one point, and is now, and really has always been, a stranger.

  As I move away from him, quivering and crying, feeling the warm protectiveness of Thomas begin to swarm into my mind, I hear a voice that sounds not like the thing that lives in Isaac, but Isaac himself.

  “Iv – Ives! Wait – wait for me!”

  I run so fast and so far so as he cannot catch up.

  I do not want to ever have to return and remeet him and his face.

  I am sick of him.

  I am sick of wondering whether he is friend or foe, depending on the day. I am sick of vying for space among whatever demons seem to lurk in his soul. My emotions are not that flexible.

  “Yes, they are,” Thomas gently murmurs, and it is only then that I realize I’ve been speaking all of my thoughts aloud, in an attempt to explain to Thomas. “But no one can stay with someone like that for too long. He pollutes everything he touches.”

  “Well, everyone does,” I huff, slightly, my feet still sliding up the invisible glass. “Something must be touched in order to be polluted, but if something is never touched, they break themselves down in a different way. There’s no escape. Everyone will hurt everything they touch – but if they’d never touched it in the first place, it would have never had hope for repair.”

  “Ives,” he sighs, but there’s a hint of a smile in the word.

  “Stay with him,” I command, not even chancing a look back. “Make sure he’s safe. He’s kept... well.”

  “He’s never been safe or well, Ives.”

  “Just go.” I bite my lip. “You’re not needed here as you’re needed there.”

  “Do you want me to go?”

  “You’re needed there, regardless of what I want.”

  He seems to understand the words that I am desperately trying to bury. I just want him to listen to what I say, not what I mean, but Thomas has always been bad at taking direct orders, as much as I have.

  “Don’t worry, Ives. I won’t leave you. Not ever.”

  For once, I’m glad to hear something like that.

  eleven

  Thomas tells me what happened when I had awoken.

  I was expecting the worst.

  “He kissed you.” His voice sounds a bit stiff, but not surprised. “And then he was whispering something in your ear.”

  Even my languid, careful steps became stinted, frightened, frozen. I swallow back a heat pooling in my throat.

  “What? He...”

  “On the head!” Thomas sounds embarrassed, so much so that a hiss of laughter escapes him. “He kissed you on the head.”

  “That’s... still mildly creepy,” I murmur, staring at the ground and half-holding my breath, half-letting it out, shakily.

  “It’s more than mildly creepy. It’s downright horrifying.”

  I think back to when I had joined him last, and he had been obsessed with watching his charge sleep, and I cannot contain the tremors that reverberate through my body.

  “Hey, you okay?” Thomas’ voice is gentle and careful as I finally find a seat on the stairs, attempting to breathe.

  “Yeah – I just – ” I lose my breath, and my sense with it, for a scant moment, before I push, “ – Why would he do something like that?”

  “Because he’s sick. Sick in the head, Ives.”

  I nod, but I don’t look up to where I normally do when we converse. I know Isaac must be seriously disturbed in some way in order to believe that acting as he does is both allowed and necessary, and yet... at times, he seems to know the difference between right and wrong, good and bad.

  And then that all just... dissipates.

  “What was on his hand?” I finally voice.

  “I don’t know. It seemed to be some sort of tattoo.”

  “Does he have a tattoo?” I’m frightened of his answer, and it’s the one I’m most afraid of that he gives to me.

  “No.”

  At the least, I attempt to comfort myself, I know that Thomas saw it too. At least we all saw it.

  Just another thing that links us. Something shared and seen in this abominable world.

  I take a few moments to find air and my bearings and to cease my sudden shakes before I try to speak frankly again.

  “Alert me when the trio wakes up and keeps walking.” A part of me still wants to keep an eye on them. As if I want to make sure they’re kept safe from my own kin.

  “Trio?”

  “The lost soul doesn’t count,” I mumble, almost angrily. I don’t know when or where I’ve adopted that mindset, but there seems to be a part of my mind mad that he did not already ascertain that. “Can you please – just – tell me when they wake up.”

  “Of course.” His voice is gentle and comforting, and I lie down on the staircase, carefully arranging my hair, staring at the sky and breathing while shaking.

  Why does it affect me so?

  Is it because I am rather aware that in some ways, I am the same? That there is something vital broken or ruined or messed within me?

  No. It cannot be that. I cannot be that. I am better. I have control that he does not. I have control that they all do not.

  Love, and anger, and sadness, and fear.

  I am better leeched of them.

  Next thing I know, Thomas is alerting me to their wakefulness, and the image and colors of the group I have come to know expands on my viewer.

  Isaac’s charge seems to be aware that something bad happened – or, perhaps, something unrelated happened to her that she is, obviously, very aware of. She sits and stares around at things as if she’s contemplating the very molecular makeup and structure of them, and seems introspective and quiet. When people talk to her, she mostly ignores them, or gives them bare answers. I find myself, briefly, within her, and for that, I can appreciate her, despite the fact that I am still battling whether or not she’s completely real. I’m sure she’d be able to acknowledge my standpoint.

  Finally, the one with the glasses urges Isaac’s charge to get up and continue walking. Charge seems to be staring, now, at the ash of the staircase as if expecting there is more to the solidity or story of the object than what immediately meets the eye before raising her head, nodding distantly, and rising to her feet. It’s silent as she does so, except for the erratic breathing of her wild haired companion and the haunting giggles of the toddler.

  It’s a normal day, I suppose, just like every day is a normal day, but there feels to be no sense of normalcy anywhere. I do not know what normal is supposed to be, but I do know that this is not it.

  Still, it’s normal for us, so I journey on in silent consideration.

  They begin a journey, another day, alone, one that they could never know the full scope or impact of. They begin a trek for what they hope is a valiant reaso
n – what they must believe is a valiant reason.

  I suppose that’s an impossible lie. An impossible lie that good must exist in this world of evil, too.

  Everyone needs impossible lies to survive, don’t they?

  It’s on this normal, impossible day that another figure on the staircase begins to approach the group of four – no, three, as the lost soul has disappeared into the cascades of mist as she loves and is perpetually prone to do. This figure is large, and lumbering, and even Isaac’s charge pauses in her steps.

  The toddler doesn’t, though. The baby blonde launches herself from the group and goes running towards the man.

  Glasses gasps, as if shocked, frightened, confused. She scrunches a large nose and closes blinking, black eyes. Isaac’s charge watches her, but doesn’t follow in the fear.

  The toddler and the lumbering figure collide. As he moves closer, I notice greased black hair, a stubbly beard, a white shirt that reveals his arms and chest, light blue boxer briefs. It seems like he’s going to bed. He holds the baby, blinks, and looks down at it.

  It’s cooing up at him, touching his beard and his nose and giggles loudly. He stares down at it as if he’s never seen anything like it.

  It’s Isaac’s charge that finally moves forward, releasing the hands of Glasses, at which she squeals loudly. Though a comforting word would have been given from the charge normally, today she’s fixated on the new visitor.

  It’s as if she’s been waiting for him to come, and is glad he has finally arrived, so that she might move on with her life. Her arms are crossed over each other, and she bends into her steps towards him.

  “Hi, uh... can you put the child down, maybe?”

  “The child.” Greased hair huffs down at her. “Like you don’t know her name, or anything.”

  “I don’t even know if it’s a ‘her’, to tell you the truth.”

  “Nah? Haven’t you ever checked?”

  “No?” She sounds perturbed – uncomfortable. “Why– no, nevermind, don’t answer that. You know you can be a her without a specific set of parts, right?” She says it as flippantly as though he’d be rather brainless to think otherwise.

  He gapes, tilts his head, stares blankly, and after a moment or two of tense silence, Charge sighs it off. “Forget it. Can I just have the kid back?” Though eyes are distrustful, they uncross, hold themselves out for the return of the baby.

  Instead, however, Greased hair takes a moment to properly look at her, as though her mouth has given him reason to take notice. Dark eyes roam up and down Charge, slowly, hesitating everywhere but her face. When he smiles, there’s something deep and near sinister behind his expression. He whistles out slowly, loud and sudden enough to make Glasses jump and whimper behind Charge.

  “You’re one pretty looking lady. You know that?”

  I can see her swallow. I can almost see her thoughts. It’s like she’s an open book, clear pages of What the hell is going on? This dude is weird. “Thanks, I... I guess. Uh... can I have the kid back, now?”

  He shrugs. “I dunno. Can you?”

  “Uh. I mean, yeah. Last I checked, I’ve been watching the kid since now.”

  “And good job doing so. Not like she ran up to the first stranger she saw immediately, or anything.”

  She’s quite thoroughly done with him at this point – and the shocked flush under her freckles clearly portrays it. I sigh, glance and sit down. He’s wearing a white shirt. Just like Isaac and I are. Maybe...

  I formulate my hypothesis into the form of a question that I throw to the only one with any answers around here. “Thomas, is he one of those lost souls too?”

  It’s not the words that I’m waiting for that I’m greeted with. It’s silence. It’s cold, bright, empty, white silence.

  My heart begins beating quicker, just slightly, my mind quickly catching memory of the promise that he would not leave me.

  “Thomas?”

  Nothing.

  Perhaps something happened. Perhaps he was attacked, or died, or the connection to this world was bad, or he’s speaking but I can’t hear him, or – perhaps I’m overreacting.

  “Thomas?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  I release a breath at a familiar phrase in a familiar voice. “Thomas, where were you?”

  “I’m sorry,” he only repeats.

  “Did you get my question?” I glance at the person behind the glass, then back up. “Is this man a lost soul too?”

  “No. But I know someone who is.”

  “Thomas, I don’t understand you.”

  “You don’t need to understand me, but – ”

  “There is no point to speaking if I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

  “But,” he continues, pushes, “you will, momentarily.”

  Thomas’ odd behavior is distracting me from the sound of the conversation going on behind me. I watch him with unrestrained confusion. “If there is something you want to say, I request that you say it.”

  “I tried my best.” His voice is a mere whisper, an echo of what I know it to be. “I’m sorry I didn’t succeed – but I did try.”

  I open my mouth to challenge him, to question him, but every word I have any consideration of voicing disappears with the sound of something behind me.

  “Get your hands off of her!”

  It’s like a misplaced voice in a misplaced moment, a knight in shining armor coming after the death of the damsel, words succeeding the end of a book.

  I feel like I’m in a dream, more so than ever. As I turn, I feel as if I’m out of my body, and more in it than I’ve ever been.

  On the other side of the glass is a young man, awkwardly placed in with the other strangers. It is his face that I feel as if I’ve never seen.

  Small nose. Slightly downturned.

  High cheekbones, pressing into his ears.

  Long, thin lips.

  An emptiness and infinity in the chasms of light blue eyes.

  I scream.

  My fists come, and they make contact with the barrier. I can feel Thomas cringe away even through the surge of sudden grief.

  “ISAAC!”

  He can’t hear me.

  He will never hear me again.

  He gave himself to the other world.

  His soul is lost.

  twelve

  Thomas had said that there were many versions of me and Isaac that had existed on this staircase.

  He told us that we had thousands of charges – and, thus, since we did not connect with any of them ever, and were always reset, we must have been alive “for the first time” thousands of times. We must have woken up, and lived, and breathed, thousands of different times.

  Losing Isaac is not losing him once.

  It’s losing him in every version of me.

  “Ives, calm down!”

  The words mean nothing to me. They’re as meaningless as the air – something I do not, and can not, even comment on because of its insignificance.

  I hated him last night.

  I try to remember this as I beat on a mirror, uselessly, knowing that I cannot go through without risking – something – some boundaries Thomas decided to never spell out for me.

  I hated him last night.

  But somehow, every part of my soul screams that he was my brother.

  He was something that needed to be fixed, and cradled, and cared for.

  Not thrown uselessly away.

  “He – he can come back.” I, the girl who cannot love, chokes through pain that is deigning to close my throat as I try to speak. “He’s just visiting over there. He can return.”

  “Ivory – I’m sorry – ”

  He doesn’t even have a chance to explain as my vision dissolves into tears, still staring at his figure splayed far away. Hot, burning, salty tears seem to claim every piece of peace.

  He’s gone.

  I shouldn’t have left him last night. If I hadn’t left him – I could have helped! He wouldn’t have
gone...

  I would have stopped him...

  Sniffling, fighting for breath. I’m still standing, and staring blankly at the human trapped on the other side that has the designation in my mind as brother. I am not gone. I am not a pile of sobbing, heaving flesh. I stand there, my emotions somewhat contained within my fighting soul, and yet, so much more apparent than I feel they’ve ever been. My nose twitches and my red eyes stare forward through a glaze.

  Brother.

  I am standing still, and yet I feel as if I’m screaming. I am only gasping for breath through my sniffling nose occasionally, and I feel as if I’m drowning.

  The fists that I have not realized I clenched at my side dig into my palms as I wait for Thomas to explain why he is lost. When he seems too frightened to approach my state, I throw myself at him.

  “You said we could visit our charge. Why is this a problem? Why is he... lost?”

  “Many reasons,” Thomas says, automatically, quickly. His dislike for Isaac is still apparent in the slight shift of his voice when we are on the subject of him, and yet, there’s much apology within his air, regretting either his words or Isaac’s actions. “It’s true. A Moderator can visit their charge by putting themselves through the barrier. But... they cannot be seen. Or heard. Or felt. They arrive in somewhat of the form of a phantom, and are only there – not perceived.”

  As Thomas speaks, I’m watching Isaac’s charge turn and look at him, into that gaze that I’ve known so well, that gaze that seems to hold forgotten secrets and memories, and he stares back into those bright, piercing eyes that seem to know everything about every world, and he steps forward and shields her from the stranger, his body brushing her in the process.

  Solidified.

  Gone.

  “How can one keep oneself – from being more than a phantom, that is,” I near whisper.

  “You have a choice. In the space between. About how much to drag with you. You – you can feel it, I’m told.” The smile I feel is somewhat sad. “You force yourself to be more than a soul – to be solid. To bring your body with you. That risks a return.”

  “Risks,” I note, “but does not guarantee impossible.” My voice is not searching, not pushing, not even questioning – it is merely empty, gone, defeated. But the words still fall from me, a natural instinct to this body.