Author's Preface
While the later part of the evening arrived in 2025—a fairly early morning was on the horizon in Moonvale in 1988, and Aravali was awake long before anyone else there.
He pushed the door open, slowly and quietly—peering into the rounded room with the checkerboard floor, seeing no one at all nearby, a few of the candle sconces lit, giving the room a bit of light, but neither Zyon nor Amory were around. The couch by the wall was smeared with blood, the lopsided one untouched and unoccupied, the wood-paneled TV off and dust-covered, and the windows across the room were all darkened by the nighttime now.
Aravali eased into the room, silently pushing the door shut behind him, pausing and sighing as he stood there for a moment to gather his thoughts.
When he’d initially awoken in that small white bed on the top floor of Moonvale, it had taken him a moment to remember precisely where he was, and why he was no longer sleeping at home. The frantic, wild memories of the previous day came back to him, feeling like a long, hazy dream of terror and trauma, and he remembered the day ending with a quiet, somber shower, blood running across the ceramic of the tub and flooding down the drain. Still, despite the insanity of it all—the car chase, the shootout, the powers, the fights, and the horrific close call with death that he’d endured—he felt calmer than ever now, and he still couldn’t fathom how.
But, perhaps the how’s didn’t matter.
After all, he’d woken up with something still gnawing at him, disturbing him, urging and nudging him to act—and so, here he was, standing in the checkerboard room that was evidently part of the year 2025, wearing a clean-cut button-up of a faded black color, not at all resembling the disheveled and bloodied mess of a man he was last night.
Now, he was fresh, clean, rested, and recovered, fully prepared to explore yet another impossible thing in order to find someone whom he believed needed to be found.
Aravali gazed over at the double-doors, inhaling deeply before he marched toward them. He pulled the doors open, gazing across the enormous room that took up the majority of the front of the manor, and he strolled clear across it, glimpsing around at the sconces and the rounded stairway along the wall before he headed for the exit.
When he pushed the front doors open and stepped onto the stoop, he scanned over everything outside—the woodlands and the old black fence around the manor, the large sign in the tall grass, and the driveway that led down the expansive hillside, where he was just able to see a few of the lights from the distant town of Mapleview.
Aravali shut the doors, walked down the stone stairs, and strode across the gravel driveway, traveling through the night and feeling surprisingly comfortable, as it was hardly chilly outside compared to what he’d been getting accustomed to for the past few weeks. He followed the twin pair of gravel tracks down the long grassy hill, approaching the street and stepping onto it as he headed toward the nearest buildings he could see far ahead of him.
“Looks like the north side of town,” he mumbled to himself.
Aravali reached a sidewalk and stepped onto it, marching alongside a long concrete wall with a barred fence on the top of it—and then, he slowed to a stop there, turning and gazing up at the wall and fence, vaguely recognizing it. Yes, this walled-off hillside existed in the 1980s as well, and it looked considerably more weather-worn now, but that wasn’t what caught his attention.
No—what caught his attention was simply the fact that this wall was known to wrap all the way around the only graveyard in town, Mapleview Cemetery.
He stood there, hands pocketed, eyeing the wall and thinking of everything he’d heard yesterday evening—most notably now, the thing that Zyon and Raven had discussed. Amory had mentioned, during his emotional getaway, that he now preferred to be in a time where his parents were gone, despite however he’d initially felt about it.
Aravali looked down, a thought occurring to him, and his eyes traveled back up to the fence, deciding to simply follow his hunch.
So—he broke into a brisker stride, traveling the sidewalk until he found the walkway that ventured left. He followed it, walking in between the fenced wall and a collection of trees, until he found the narrow concrete path that led into the cemetery.
Aravali entered the graveyard and began hiking up a long hillside, strolling on the concrete path and glancing around in the darkness, seeing only graves on either side of him. For a few minutes, he merely carried on, scanning over everything in sight.
Then, around the top of the hillside, where everything in the graveyard was clearest in view, he stopped—spotting a single person far to the northeast of him, someone with long black hair, sitting cross-legged in the grass and facing away from him.
Aravali narrowed his eyes at him from afar, sighing heavily and resuming his pace.
He made the long walk across the graveyard, eventually approaching Amory from behind, and he paused there, saying nothing for a moment.
Amory merely sat, devoid of any expression, hunched slightly forward and staring at the large rectangular tombstone in front of him—a huge conjoined one, one that belonged to both Candice and Joseph Evervale, Joseph’s name inscribed on the left, Candice’s on the right, his mother’s death marked at 2020, and his father’s marked at 2024. In the center of the giant stone was a large, elegant carving of a rose, and just underneath it was a single phrase, reading Here lie the Evervales, in forever peace .
He remained still there for a long while, knowing full well that someone was standing behind him, and not caring in the slightest.
“I wondered when you’d get over yourself enough to come here,” Amory mumbled vacantly.
Aravali made a face, giving him a look from behind. “Well… that’s not very nice.”
Amory blinked, turning his head and peering back over his shoulder. He spotted the doctor there, then faced forward again.
“Oh… sorry,” he muttered. “I thought you were Crowe.”
“Ah. Well…” Aravali nodded sideways. “He’s… actually… sleeping off a rather difficult night. All three of us did… and… he’d probably be pretty upset with me if he knew I came here without him. He wanted to set straight off after you, and I told him not to… for a lot of reasons.”
Amory nodded mildly, not replying.
Aravali stared intently at the back of his head. “Do you want to be left alone?”
Amory continued to gaze almost trancelike into the tombstone.
“No,” he answered seconds later.
Aravali nodded, taking a step closer. “You mind if I join you here?”
“No,” Amory said again.
Aravali sank down beside him, sitting in the grass and folding his legs as well.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
After another minute of staring absently into the tombstone, Amory glanced over at the doctor.
“How’d you know I was here?” he thought to ask.
Aravali intertwined his fingers and sighed, raising his eyebrows at the stone. “Call it a hunch… or… empathy. Couldn’t say.”
Amory stared at him, his eyes narrowing slightly. “Empathy…?”
Aravali nodded, turning and meeting his eyes. “I do still intend to take you on as a patient, you know. Would you like to regard me as your psychiatrist now?”
Amory glimpsed down. “I’ve never had a shrink before…”
“Well… now’s as good a time as any,” Aravali offered. “If you’re willing.”
Amory was quiet for a second, making a thoughtful expression and meeting his eyes again.
“Have you ever lost a parent?” he asked.
Aravali nodded. “Yes… both of them. I actually just lost one of them right before I’d started at Moonvale. Why do you ask?”
Amory frowned, staring into the tombstone intensely.
“Did you ever…” he uttered, sighing and running a hand down his face. “Did you ever regret not saying something to them? Or… not getting closure with them?”
Aravali looked to the side, pondering on this and making a slow, affirming nod. “Well… yes… I did with my father. He died when I was fairly young, and no one expected it, so… it left a lot of things up in the air. But… in a morbid way… it helped my relationship with my mother quite a bit, because I made absolutely sure never to leave anything unsaid with her. I spent time with her, and took care of her to the best of my ability, and gave her some peace of mind. We all learn the lesson that life doesn’t last forever eventually… and that’s how I did.”
Amory was silent for several seconds longer, glaring at the stone as if it had wronged him.
“I always thought they…” he muttered. “I always thought… I always thought that I’d finally be happy if they were just gone. If they were finally just gone, and all that garbage in my head just went away, and everything that happened could just never happen again. I always thought that’d make me happy. And… look. It’s 2025. They’re both dead. I got my wish here. Right?”
He swatted at the tombstone, choking out a noise and shaking his head.
“But I’m not happy,” Amory growled. “I hate it. I hate it, and I don’t know why I even care…”
He lowered his head, hanging it above his lap and pressing his knuckles into his forehead.
“Yes I do,” Amory griped, dropping his hands to his lap and raising his head again. “I met a little kid today that just forgives his crazy abusive mother like it’s nothing. He still moved on, and he has a better life now than he did when he lived with her… but he can still love and forgive her, too. And he didn’t go out of his way to rip her heart out like I…”
He pressed his knuckles to his head again, this time even harder.
“I mean… you were right,” Amory admitted, turning to Aravali. “You were right. Looking at the way the lab actually was… there’s no way in hell they actually contacted my parents and told them anything. That means that me and Raven just disappeared off the face of the planet, as far as Mom and Dad ever knew… and I told myself it didn’t matter, because they were garbage parents, and they never cared about us, but I…”
He sighed heatedly, gritting his teeth and feeling furious with himself.
“But I know they did,” Amory conceded, glaring at the doctor with an angry, conflicted expression. “They didn’t do everything right—hell, they didn’t even do half of everything right—but I remember—I remember them showing us that they gave a damn about us, and I never let myself think about that. Not for fifteen years. Ever .”
Aravali nodded quietly as he listened.
“I mean… God… do you know how much I hate hurting people?” Amory breathed, motioning to the tombstone. “I can’t believe I could hurt my own parents more than they ever hurt me…”
“Well… it’s only natural for your perspective to be a little skewed when you’re thinking of your parents, as opposed to everyone else in the world,” Aravali commented. “Especially if the circumstances they kept you in were exceptionally negative and detrimental.”
“Yeah, but still…” Amory sighed, combing his fingers through his hairs and plopping back, lying across the grass and staring up at the night sky. “Fifteen years went by. I had plenty of time to figure this all out before, and I just never did…”
“Well… the time you spent in Canterbury would’ve brought about its own traumas and problems,” Aravali informed. “Any one of which could have hindered your own development and personal growth in a large number of ways.”
“It’s still not right,” Amory mumbled, planting his hands over his face. “It’s still not right…”
Aravali glanced down at him, nodding and pausing for a moment. Then, he leaned slightly closer, patting him once on the side.
“Hey,” the doctor said. “You have an incredible and unique ace up your sleeve… in the form of a doorway, leading directly back to a time where you can put the issue of closure to rest.”
Amory lowered his hands to the ground, gazing up at him.
“You can mourn them here in 2025,” Aravali said. “Or… you can walk back into 1988, and you can seek out the closure you need. I’m not going to tell you what to do, or what’s right for you… I just want you to remember, the door is quite literally open, and the option to provide some closure to your family is very much there. Fifteen years late is probably a lot better than never.”
Amory stared up at him for a moment longer, sighing deeply.
“They left me a mansion,” he mumbled. “I couldn’t believe it when Zyon told me that… but that gigantic house up the hill, that huge place, is just… I mean, that’s something they worked their whole lives for… and they left it to Raven and I. When Zyon first told me that, it felt like I just… like I just couldn’t have heard him right. I mean… it doesn’t sound like them at all to me… but that’s… that’s because I only ever remembered the bad parts of them, and not the good. It’s like my mind just erased all the good memories so walking away forever would be easier… but it’s just… it’s not easier anymore. I wanna look at the rest of Evervale Manor. I wanna go up the stairs, and look around, and explore that place… but I can’t bring myself to. I don’t wanna see any of the rest of it yet… because I feel like I… I feel like I haven’t… earned it. I feel like I owe them so much… and I haven’t even bothered to see them or talk to them yet…”
Aravali nodded, placing his fingertips together thoughtfully.
“Well… I have an idea,” the doctor said. “There have been a lot of things happening in rapid succession, and most of us haven’t had a spare minute to breathe or adjust, much less sit down and talk, and level everything out for one another. So… maybe, after we go to visit your parents, if you want to… then, afterwards, we can all meet up in Evervale Manor, we can all discuss everything that’s going on, and we can all fully understand the situation we’re in, not to mention, we can clear the air with each other. It sounds like you facing your parents is a great big cloud hanging over your head… and a lot of us have a similar situation going on here, too. We all need to clear the air so we can manage everything healthily, and manage it together.”
Amory nodded mildly, sitting upright again and giving him a curious look. “Okay, but… when you say all of us…”
“I mean you, me, Raven, Crowe, Elaine, and your friend Zyon,” Aravali clarified. “Elaine and I need to be fully informed on everything involving our patients, and you and your little trio need to hammer some things out between one another… but we don’t need to involve any of the other patients for right now. Some of them don’t tend to handle extra stress very well, and this could very well put them over the edge.”
Amory folded his arms atop his knees, nodding again. “I have a feeling Evervale Manor is gonna be the heart and soul of a lot of important things… and it feels like… this is where it starts. It feels like it’s… starting right now… just with us talking, here.”
“Well… it very well could be,” Aravali replied. “What would you like to do now?”
Amory let out another heavy breath, gazing into the tombstones and feeling strangely, calmly prepared now—ready to do something he hadn’t been equipped to do for fifteen years.
“I think it’s time to go back home,” he said softly. “That needs to happen… and then… everything else can happen right after, like you said.”
Aravali gave him a nod, and both of them began to stand.
“Would you like to tell your sister where you’re going?” the doctor wondered. “She may want to do the same thing you are.”
“No… no, not now,” Amory decided, shaking his head. “I wanna go back first. I don’t want Raven there… not… not yet. I wanna make sure Mom and Dad aren’t… y’know… worse than they used to be. If they are, then she just… she doesn’t need to go through that. I’d rather scope them out first and make sure they’re actually safe to go back to before I tell her anything.”
Aravali nodded and folded his arms, eyeing him interestingly. “You have a long history of playing the ‘parent’ role, don’t you?”
Amory stared at him, breathing out a laugh. “Is it that obvious…?”
“Well… not on first impression, no,” Aravali admitted. “Honestly, you seem like a child at heart who’s trying to recapture some time you might’ve lost in your younger years… but, whenever you talk about someone else, like Raven… or, whenever you’re put in the position of needing to be a protector… then an entirely different side of you comes out.”
Amory smiled at him with a look of intrigue. “You’re really good at your job. Y’know that?”
“Oh… I could be better,” Aravali laughed. “I still haven’t gotten around to organizing a group session… but, well, I suppose that’s going to work itself out today. Our group session won’t be exactly what I’d planned for it to be. It will most certainly be productive, though.”
Amory nodded, and they fell silent for a moment.
“Are you ready?” Aravali asked.
Amory gave one final glance to the tombstone, then nodded again and turned on his heel, the two of them marching out of Mapleview Cemetery together.
Mapleview, North Carolina.
December 2nd, 1988.
6:41 A.M.
In Moonvale Mental Hospital—Crowe, Raven, Donna, and John remained asleep in their respective rooms upstairs, and Elaine marched about very early in the day, seeing to her tasks before sunrise like usual.
Just after preparing breakfast and organizing the medications, she headed downstairs—stopping in the back hall when she noticed that one of the patients was not in bed.
Iggy was seated on the floor at the very end of the hallway, his back pressed to the white door of the utility closet, his head slumped over, and his mouth hanging agape, his jean jacket covering him like a blanket as faint, throaty snores escaped him.
Elaine gave him a peculiar look, stepping forward and slapping the wall hard.
Iggy snorted and jumped awake, blinking several times and turning his head, giving her a vexed, bleary sort of stare.
“Iggy,” Elaine said, squinting at him. “What are you doing sleeping on the closet?”
Iggy swallowed, pushing himself more upright and combing his wild hairs back. “Well, I ahh… I just didn’t want anybody to go using it by accident.”
Elaine stared, her expression flat.
“Go back to bed,” she ordered.
“Mnnn… okay, boss,” Iggy yawned, lumbering to his feet and wandering toward her. “But, ahh… just so you know, all that stuff that was in that closet is… probably looong gone now.”
He meandered past her, and Elaine turned, watching him go with a strange look on her face.
Then—the closet door opened behind her.
Elaine blinked, turning back around—and seeing Aravali and Amory emerging from the closet, both of them stopping just when they spotted her.
Everyone fell still, merely staring at one another for a moment.
Elaine made a face, her eyes narrowing at the closet—and what little she could see of the checkerboard floor on the other side of the doorway. She stepped closer, eyeing it intently—and Amory quickly shut the door, trying to smile politely at her and only halfway succeeding.
Elaine then stopped, her gaze shifting over to Aravali, giving him a look.
“Aha…” Aravali attempted a smile as well. “Yes… I know we have some things to talk about, but I just have one little errand to run before we, um…”
“Oh… we have plenty to talk about,” Elaine breathed, crossing her arms and perching her brow at him. “You still haven’t explained what exactly happened to you last night, and now there’s a secret room down the back hall instead of my utility closet?”
“Elaine… we all very much need to catch each other up on everything. I know that,” Aravali assured. “I just have one more thing to do before…”
“No—Dr. Chavan, you always say that, and then you wander off into some insane situation that you barely manage to come back from,” Elaine replied sharply. “I’ve been trusting Crowe to keep you out of harm’s way, and he’s done an incredible job of that—but these people are acting far more brazenly than they were before you arrived here, and the risk is too steep for any of us to ignore. Now is simply not the time for you to go wandering off yet again.”
“I understand that, but this is important,” Aravali insisted.
Elaine glared at him, her nostrils flaring, remaining silent for a few seconds.
“How important?” she asked.
“Mental health important,” Aravali told her firmly. “ Patient-healing important.”
Elaine paused, her eyes flickering past him and surveying Amory, then returning to the doctor.
“And he’s a patient now,” she muttered.
“Yes—he is,” Aravali affirmed. “And believe me—he’s capable of everything that Crowe is. I’ve seen it. He’s saved my life once already. I feel perfectly content making a trip into town today with him there.”
Elaine gave him an intense look. “You bet your life on that?”
“Absolutely,” Aravali replied without hesitation.
The two of them stared silently at each other.
Amory’s eyes shifted between them both, feeling as if he was missing something.
“Listen. I plan for all of us to have a sit-down afterwards,” Aravali told the orderly. “We can all clear the air completely—but this is something that needs to happen first, and it’s a breakthrough that’s been fifteen years in the making. It’s important. It’s just one more thing—and then we’ll all talk everything out and make a solid plan together right after. All right?”
Elaine gave him a long, grave stare, sighing deeply and reaching into the pocket of her white overcoat, pulling out a ring of keys.
“Here. Crowe told me to give these back to you,” she said, planting the keys into his palm. “He said he was the one driving all of you back here last night, and he left your car parked crookedly right in front of the stairs… and left a giant tire mark on the edge of the grass, like he just flew in here like a bat out of hell and skidded across the lawn and the driveway, newspapers scattered all over the place for some reason. Almost looked like he arrived here pretty urgently , like there was an emergency going on… yet, no one feels the need to tell me why…”
“Soon,” Aravali promised, clutching his keys and giving her a serious look. “I will tell you everything soon. Hand to God, I will.”
“What exactly is so damned important that you have to run off and do it now? ” Elaine asked.
Aravali sighed.
“Raven and I haven’t seen our parents in fifteen years,” Amory answered for him. “I’m going to go see them today.”
Elaine stared at him thoughtfully for a second, making a slight shake of the head. “Wait, she’s not… she’s not old enough to have been away from home for that long.”
“Canterbury Lab evidently apprehended minors, Elaine,” Aravali informed grimly. “Crowe, Raven, and Amory have all been there since they were children… and none of their parents are likely to know a thing about it.”
Elaine’s mouth drifted agape. “Oh, good Lord…”
Her eyes landed on Amory again, and then, her expression seemed to soften. She didn’t appear happy or pleased at the situation at hand, but she flashed an understanding smile, nodding and waving them both past her.
“All right, all right, go on,” Elaine urged, stepping aside and letting them pass. “But you had damn well make your way back here—and I mean soon .”
“We will,” Aravali replied.
“I won’t let anything happen,” Amory promised.
They both walked around the corner and vanished from her view, leaving her alone to press her back to the wall, dig her fingers into her temples, and release a long, agitated sigh.
Aravali and Amory strolled out of the mental hospital, greeted by a blast of icy December air.
The early sunrise fought to shine from behind a thick winter overcast, and the Oldsmobile Cutlass still sat in the lopsided position where Crowe had left it, thick tire marks left in the gravel driveway from where he’d skidded haphazardly into the small parking lot the night before.
Aravali strolled over to the driver door and pulled it open, Amory climbing into the passenger side. They quickly sealed themselves in the car away from the cold weather, and the doctor started the engine and slowly began to drive off, the car cruising down the narrow gravel path and rolling beneath the tunnel of treetops that led to the back road.
Amory rested his chin on his knuckles, gazing absentmindedly out the window.
Aravali drove steadily onto the back road and toward town, then glanced over at him. “Where are we going, exactly?”
Amory blinked and turned to him. “You know where Greensboro Park is?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay… just go to the main road that goes past there, and I can point you down the right road.”
“All right.”
Aravali drove onward, approaching the intersection and stopping at the red light. Amory stared out the window for a moment longer, the light eventually turning green, and the car steadily pulling forward.
“She seems pretty worried about you,” Amory mumbled.
Aravali glimpsed between him and the windshield. “Well… she’s worried about all of us, considering… everything…”
“She’s amazing,” Amory remarked. “She’s like a mother to everybody there, isn’t she?”
Aravali raised his brows, making a sideways nod. “I suppose so… yeah. Honestly, I found it remarkable that she managed the entire workload on her own before I got there.”
Amory gave him an odd look. “Why was she there alone…?”
“Well… I’m gathering Canterbury had a hand in that, too,” Aravali replied darkly. “Sounds like they ran everyone else off with threats, or… worse…”
Amory stared at him. “But she stayed there? All by herself…?”
Aravali fell silent, driving and tapping his fingers to the steering wheel, pondering on this.
He hadn’t spared the time to think about it—especially with how hectic life had been lately—but it was entirely possible, and even likely, that the men of Canterbury had threatened Elaine’s life as well. But, for whatever reason, she didn’t choose to leave like all the others had.
“Yes… I suppose she did,” the doctor uttered.
Amory leaned back in his seat, crossing his arms and blowing a raspberry. “Whew. She must care about everyone there a lot , then.”
Aravali nodded mildly at the windshield. “Yes. She must…”
Amory continued gazing forward for a second, then glimpsed over at him. “And so do you.”
Aravali didn’t reply, making a shrug as he drove.
“Especially… see… this is what’s really confusing about you,” Amory added, straightening up in his seat and turning more toward him. “You’re going pretty far out of your way for me, and we hardly even know each other yet. I’m not even like an official patient yet, and you’re still just… I mean, you know you’re risking your life right now, right?”
“Oh… believe me, I know,” Aravali replied in a low, soft voice.
“That’s why it’s so crazy that you’d…” Amory stopped, trailing off, as something had just caught his attention in the corner of his eye.
He turned his head, staring into the back seat—only just noticing the thick, deep stains on the cushions behind him, dark crimson blotches and smears covering his back seat and spotting along many of the newspapers and magazines that still sat in a scattered mess back there.
Amory stared at the bloody scene in the back, then turned to the driver seat again, giving the doctor a grave, aghast look.
“Okay… what else happened last night?” he asked. “What happened after I left?”
Aravali glanced at him. “Where did that come from?”
“I don’t know—where did that come from?” Amory replied, pointing at the back. “The whole back seat is just covered in blood.”
Aravali paused, glimpsing into the rearview mirror. “Oh. I suppose it is. That makes sense…”
“What makes—what happened?!” Amory demanded. “Did Vincent come back? Did something happen to Raven or Crowe?!”
“No—”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure.”
“Then whose blood is that?!”
“It’s mine ,” Aravali stated. “Now don’t look back there anymore. You don’t need to stare at that morbid mess—just focus on what we’re doing now.”
Amory gaped at him, shaking his head. “Oh, okay, well no wonder your girlfriend doesn’t wanna let you leave right now—”
“Elaine is the orderly , and it doesn’t matter ,” Aravali told him firmly. “We’re only making the one trip today, and I seriously doubt if the men in black from Canterbury are going to go looking for either one of us at your childhood home. Everything will be fine.”
“Oh my God… I shouldn’t have left last night,” Amory sighed, leaning farther back and running his hands down his face. “I knew I shouldn’t have left last night… and lo and behold, I wasn’t there to protect everyone, yet again…”
“Amory,” Aravali said seriously. “That was entirely my fault. I shouldn’t have gone back out after everything else that already happened last night. I felt too damn determined to get done what I set out to get done—and those people were hanging around my home, waiting for just such an opportunity. I made a mistake, and I should have known better. It’s not your fault. Everything in the world isn’t on you to fix. You do understand that, don’t you?”
“Did they shoot you?” Amory asked, dropping his hands to his lap.
“Well… yes,” Aravali sighed.
“How did you live …?” Amory breathed.
“Crowe, Raven, and your angel friend are how I lived,” Aravali replied. “If Zyon hadn’t been sleeping on that couch when we left the manor, then you would’ve seen another big collection of bloodstains on those cushions, too. It was a very close call, believe me—but your friends are fairly capable. Like I said—everything in the world doesn’t always have to fall onto you.”
“I’m sorry,” Amory mumbled regretfully. “I still should’ve been there to…”
“No—shush,” Aravali ordered, raising a finger as he drove. “You have done plenty enough as it is, and how many times do I need to remind you that you’ve saved my life once already? I don’t want to hear you apologize for that. You’ve got nothing to be sorry about. Nothing whatsoever.”
“Okay, I’m s…” Amory sighed, wincing and planting his hands over his face again.
Aravali gave him another glance. “That’s really compulsive for you, isn’t it?”
Amory plopped his hands back down, tossing his head back against the seat.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” he mumbled.
“Nothing is wrong with you,” Aravali told him. “Honestly, it’s fairly normal for an abuse victim to over-apologize. It’s just another thing to recognize and work on… and it’s not because anything is wrong with you. It’s just the nature of all people. We all have things to work on.”
“Okay,” Amory sighed.
The two fell silent, and as they did, the Oldsmobile began cruising down the road that ran alongside Greensboro Park—a road that looked bizarrely unchanged since the early 1970s, with the park to the right, the intersection in the middle, and the large, ancient oak tree, still standing tall and strong on the far corner, just ahead of them.
Amory gazed out the windshield, feeling a strange sort of sensation beginning to rise up inside as he absorbed everything around him. It began to feel as if he’d traveled through time yet again, but not through any gateways, doorways, or eruptions of impulsive power; no, now, he simply felt as if he’d quietly ventured back to the past somehow, back to childhood, where the misfits three would run amok through the park or trek across it on their way to school, where they would meet up beneath the giant oak tree, and where they would disappear into the distant woodlands bordering the playgrounds and walkways, vanishing off to their secret clubhouse.
Aravali cruised through the green light, driving past the giant oak tree and approaching the small, narrow back road beyond it—the road that always led back home.
Amory’s hand began to curl into a fist atop his lap, and suddenly, he found himself wondering if this was the right course of action; perhaps they should have stayed at Moonvale or Evervale Manor, and maybe they all should have started clearing the air with one another before he came here. Maybe the other things could be dealt with first, and maybe he could simply come back to this later on, when everything else had been settled.
But, as his hand raised up, pointing at the narrow back road, he silently resolved that his sudden anxiousness wasn’t due to any misplaced priorities. No, it was simply fear and anxiety, feeling frightened of everything he was about to face—and his first instinct was always to distance himself from whatever caused him that feeling.
That was a habit of his that needed to end today—and this was something that he’d already waited fifteen years to do. It was time for it to be done.
“Turn here,” Amory said, gesturing to the edge of the back road.
Aravali nodded, slowed the car, and flipped on the turn signal, slowly turning onto the small road that led into a more wooded area.
And, as the car coasted down the most familiar road in the world to Amory, he felt another odd sensation, a sense of assurance.
He had a lot of people to look after now, and—according to Zyon—he would likely have to seek out even more of them later on.
And now—as the car gently approached the lonesome old mailbox at the end of the long, narrow driveway—he felt as if every hard task he would encounter in the future would be much easier for him to do once he finally faced his past. He didn’t understand it, couldn’t really explain it, but he felt as if something here—something in his childhood, at this home, with this family, at the end of the narrow gravel driveway—had been holding him back from advancing forward all this time, and today would be the day he would finally begin to repair it all.
Amory motioned to the end of the driveway, and his old mailbox, Aravali nodding and bringing the car to a slower turn, the vehicle rocking slightly as it rolled over the bumpy, rocky terrain. He drove steadily down the driveway, through the small tunnel of trees and shrubbery, and then—they emerged at a clearing with a single old home directly ahead, the front yard to the left with somewhat overgrown grass, no other cars around, the driveway expanding into a slightly larger parking area to the right. The doctor pulled to the right and stopped the car at the very edge of the property, just beside the trees, and he powered off the engine, Amory taking a deep, bracing breath and glancing outside before he popped his door open.
“I’ll wait here for you,” Aravali told him. “Take all the time you need.”
Amory nodded and attempted a smile, then stepped out of the car and shut the door, pausing and sighing, just before he slowly emerged from around the Oldsmobile, taking a look at everything.
The house looked surprisingly untouched by the past fifteen years; it still had the same faded blue paint, chipped and broken in many places with a bit of water damage leaving dark streaks from the edges of the roof. The grass of the front yard looked as if it hadn’t been mowed since last month, at least, and the grass blades were beginning to rise up around the rusted metal poles of the old broken swing set.
Amory glanced at the swing set and breathed out a laugh, shaking his head and thinking it incredible that the old thing was still here after all this time. Then, his eyes landed on the spot at the edge of the yard, the side of the gravel driveway, where his parents would always park. They never parked in the larger area to the right; they always parked there, just beside the yard and perfectly in front of the house, though now, the space was empty.
He stared for a moment longer, wondering where they might have been, especially in the morning. His father might have gone off to work, if he still had the same job—or perhaps his mother had somewhere to go this morning. Or, maybe both of them had gone somewhere together, but he didn’t think that entirely likely.
Amory let out another breath, strolling down the driveway and approaching the front door, feeling strange as he gathered a closer look at it—at its window, at its worn frame, and at the rickety screen door that was still there, and still didn’t appear to close properly.
He stood still in front of the door for a second, gently pulling the screen door open and reaching for the doorknob, but he hesitated, wondering if he should knock, or simply walk in. He couldn’t know for sure. So, he inhaled and grabbed the knob, slowly turning it and pushing the thick door open—the same way he always had, gingerly, slowly, and as quietly as possible. He didn’t know why, but he felt the need to enter the home as silently as he could.
And, as he took his first step inside, suddenly it came back to him.
The pathway to the kitchen’s doorway directly ahead, the stairway just slightly to the left, and the living room being to his left directly—he remembered, turning his head and staring at the back of the empty recliner, the chair facing the old, huge television with the wood paneling on the sides, its thick glass screen now dark, off, and dimly reflecting sunlight from the nearby window. He remembered now; he always did so, always opened the door very slowly and cautiously, and always looked to the left, gauging his father’s reaction from behind, trying to enter the house without being noticed.
Only now—there was no Joseph Evervale in the chair, there was no beer or whiskey on the small table beside the recliner, there was no musk of cigarette smoke lingering on the air, and there were no afternoon sports programs playing on the giant television. The TV sat still, off, and quiet, and there wasn’t a single sound in the home, not the sound of anyone walking around upstairs preparing for their day, or shuffling about in the kitchen and clanking dishes together as they started making breakfast, nor the faint, subtle noise caused by a tiny young Raven tip-toeing up and down the stairs, not a single thing stirring whatsoever. No—now, the Evervale home looked and felt strangely and unexpectedly peaceful, quiet and somber in a way it never was before, despite that it looked and felt just the same as it had all those years ago.
How could such a thing be? How could this place, tied to so many terrible memories, and pains, and fights, and hardships, and struggles—how could it be so very inviting now? How could the place of pain and terror also be the place that felt like the greatest sanctuary of all?
Amory stood at the doorway, sunlight washing into the house from behind him, wearing a heavy expression and releasing another cloud of breath.
Perhaps that’s what it meant to call a place home.
Home was where all of the most profound and impactful things happened to a person, especially in childhood. It was the place of a child’s greatest safety, and the place of their hardest troubles. It was simply the place of their beginning, the place they first started in life, the place all of their deepest core memories—every single one of them, be them good or bad.
Amory’s eyes traveled up the stairs—remembering so many things, when little Raven would walk along the second floor’s balcony up there, her arm raised, and her small hand gliding along the top of it while she walked. He remembered the more rushed days, when all of them were expected to be somewhere, and Joseph and Candice took turns trading snippy remarks while they hurried to get showered, dressed, and ready, scrambling about that second-floor hallway and periodically smacking the kid’s bedroom doors, urging them to move faster so they wouldn’t be late for church, or a birthday party, or whatever it was they were going to. He even remembered the one birthday party that they decided to throw in the house—wherein they pushed the loveseat to the side, and they strung up a piñata from the edge of the second floor’s balcony, allowing the kids to swing an actual baseball bat at it, but that party had resulted in no one ever being allowed to hang a piñata inside again, after Amory accidentally smashed the baseball bat into a nearby lamp and thoroughly annihilated it.
Amory bit his lip, staring up at the second floor and wanting to explore it, though he felt a touch of dread at the idea of what he might find. He imagined that his old bedroom was likely cleaned out and full of storage by now, and he could understand why, but still, he didn’t want to look at it. He felt as if it would wound him to see.
Yet, nevertheless—perhaps out of curiosity, or simply in an effort to stop shying away from the unpleasant things in his life—he stepped forward and marched up the stairs, suddenly feeling like a giant, as he remembered the stairs being bigger and wider, and the side railing being near his shoulders, not by his waist.
He reached the top, gazing down the hallway and huffing out a breath. The family portraits were still on either wall—the very same ones that had been there fifteen years ago, most of them now layered with dust—and he strolled past them, stopping at his bedroom door and pausing for a moment before he pushed it open.
His old bedroom had a thin cloud of dust in the air, just visible by the shining sunlight from his window, though the window wasn’t fully in view anymore, as a few large stacks of cardboard boxes had been placed inside the room, most of them up against the window and the wall. His old small bed with the broken springs was almost entirely out of view, covered with smaller boxes and loose household items—but, the dresser remained untouched, as did the nightstand, and all of his disco posters still remained on the walls, even the one with the large rip in the corner that had been sloppily repaired with tape. His belongings still appeared to be here, the magazines he used to read stacked on his dresser where he’d kept them, and even his old hamper in the corner was still there, and still overflowing with clothes that he had long since grown out of. It looked as if they did start using this room for storage—but they also never removed anything, never even changed it, never got rid of the bed, dresser, nightstand, hamper, or posters, as if part of them expected him to someday return.
Amory felt a surge of emotions inside, swallowing and forcing them down.
Then, his gaze ventured down, landing on the nightstand—and a single, shiny object lying on it.
Amory stepped into the room, moving past the cluttered bed and staring down at the nightstand.
There sat the round, sparkly peace medallion that had been ripped from its chain during his final Halloween in the Evervale home; it had been placed right beside his bed, neatly on his nightstand, not thrown away, not destroyed, not carelessly tossed into a trash can like he would have expected. No—there it sat, as if it, too, had been waiting for him all this time.
Amory felt another wave of emotions fighting to emerge, and he inhaled a shaky breath, gulping and gently collecting the peace medallion from the nightstand, leaving a perfect dust circle on the nightstand’s surface, as the medallion had apparently been sitting there for a fairly long time. He held it, clutched it tightly, and simply stared down at it, his expression etched with thoughtful intensity, racking his brain and wondering yet again why he’d never considered that his parents might have actually given a damn…
Part of him expected to come back here and find that everything had been changed completely—the living room having an entirely new layout, the kids’ old bedrooms having been fully cleaned out and repurposed for storage, the yard cleared of everything that might have reminded the Evervales that they once had children—but, to his surprise and his now aching heart, no, everything had not been changed here, and his parents had not, in fact, removed every trace of their children from their home. He never would have put it past Candice or Joseph to get rid of everything that reminded them of their missing son and daughter, and he knew it might have made their lives easier if they had removed all the children’s belongings and simply moved on—but, apparently, that wasn’t what his parents had wanted to do.
From the look of this bedroom now—it seemed as clear as day that his parents had a very hard time letting go.
Amory glared at the medallion, slowly lowering it and staring intently at the room, feeling a bizarre sense of longing to see them now. He wore a serious face, one he hardly ever showed, and he felt a touch of guilt as well, wishing he had broken out of Canterbury like Raven and Crowe years ago, wishing he had come back here to put his parents’ minds at ease much sooner. He would never regret leaving home—but he certainly regretted waiting so long to return.
Then again—perhaps he was getting ahead of himself and making too many assumptions. It was entirely possible that they never cleaned this room out simply due to laziness, and not wanting to deal with it. Maybe his parents didn’t care as much as he was suspecting.
But, as he raised the peace medallion and stared deeply into it, he couldn’t help but feel otherwise. After all—why would his father bother keeping this medallion, of all things, if he didn’t give a damn to any degree whatsoever?
Amory sighed, pocketing the medallion and turning to leave the room, feeling as if he was beginning to confuse himself. He couldn’t know what they might have felt—and he wouldn’t know for sure until he saw them again.
But, as he thumped lightly back down the stairs, gazing around at the stillness and quietness of the house, he almost began to suspect that his parents didn’t live here anymore. He knew from Zyon that his mother and father would eventually move out of this home and live in what would become Evervale Manor, but he wasn’t sure when that was meant to happen, or if his parents lived in some other place before eventually moving into the mansion. He couldn’t recall if Zyon had mentioned a specific time period for that event, or any other details…
Amory reached the bottom of the stairs, staring absentmindedly over at the darkened television and wondering where his parents might have been, if they didn’t live here anymore. If the two of them had moved out, then they must have done it fairly recently, since all of their belongings were still here. Maybe they hadn’t moved out, and they were just in town, going to work, or running errands, or attending an event of some kind…
He stopped, turning and staring at the kitchen doorway, suddenly wishing he was a kid again, having just traveled down the stairs in the morning to be greeted by the heavenly-scented breakfast of bacon and eggs that his mother often prepared, walking into that room, seeing her kind, motherly smile…
He’d forgotten entirely about the breakfasts in the mornings. They didn’t always happen—but when they did, his mother was punctual and quick, always having a full plate ready for him before he could reach the bottom of the stairs.
Her face haunted his mind now, pale and smooth with the warmest smile in the world. He’d entirely written her off as the cheating, apathetic woman who cared nothing for her children—but, looking back at it all now, he knew for certain that she was just a troubled woman with a broken home life, and she was dealing with that struggle in a bad way, a mistake that many people in the world were guilty of. It didn’t make her an evil person; it only made her flawed and human, which was something he simply couldn’t have comprehended fifteen years ago. Back then, all he saw was his mother’s sudden disregard for her family, but he never spared a thought as to why that situation came to be.
In fact—he could even say the same for his father.
Joseph Evervale was a monster to him in his youth, someone who was truly wicked and unforgivable—but, in hindsight, Amory felt as if he understood the man a bit better. It wasn’t as if he’d ever forget the abuse, or ever allow it to happen again—but he had to admit, Joseph’s life was filled with its own turmoil. He was a military man, someone who’d fought in a war, the type of man who jumped at loud noises and cursed up a storm whenever something would trigger a harsh flashback. It made perfect sense that he hadn’t handled the trauma of war well.
His parents were only human.
Maybe—just maybe, if the two of them had grown and learned as much as Amory himself had—then perhaps it was possible for all of them to let sleeping dogs lie, and let bygones be bygones. Maybe he could actually have some kind of relationship with them. Hell—maybe Raven could, too. Perhaps all of them could work this out and move past everything they’d done in the past, and finally land somewhere in life where they no longer hurt one another.
Amory moved over to the kitchen, stopping in the doorway and gazing across the sill, quiet room—the elongated countertop, the dishes sitting clean and stacked beside the sink, and the tiled floor looking like it had still not been redone, even after a decade and a half. Compared to the rest of the kitchen, the floor looked three times older.
His eyes wandered down—fixating on a single spot in the floor, where the tiles had been chipped and broken, a single, crackled spot with dark material underneath.
Suddenly, a grave, terrible memory returned to him, and his expression darkened, feeling a festering severity in the pit of his stomach, and instantly, he felt as if his childish notions of making amends could never come to fruition.
Amory remembered rushing over to the end of that counter—ripping the gun drawer open—and pulling out the old military revolver, aiming it at his father and firing a shot that broke a shattered hole in the tiled floor.
His eyes remained fixated on the small hole in the floor—still there, after all this time—and he let out a heavy sigh.
What was he thinking? He couldn’t just walk up to his parents now and expect to be forgiven for everything that he had done. Sure, his parents weren’t innocent either—but Amory had openly shot at his father, nearly killed him, and then, he absconded with Raven and disappeared for fifteen long years, without so much as a single visit or call, leaving his parents high and dry with no notice or peace of mind whatsoever.
He couldn’t expect to be forgiven now.
Just because Amory himself was willing to forgive didn’t mean that either of his parents were.
By now, Candice must have worked herself into a place of detachment and acceptance, acting as if she’d never had children, just as she learned to do before. Joseph had probably felt relieved not to be around the kids anymore, especially with all the noise they had caused, making him jolt awake from a nap or endure another war-related nightmare. Even if some part of them cared, they probably felt far more at peace now than they did with their children around. After all—Amory had shot at one of them, and he left them both without a care in the world.
Why on earth would they ever want to see him again…?
Slam .
The distant sound of a closing car door caught his attention—and Amory turned away from the kitchen doorway, staring instead at the open front door, out the screen door, feeling a nervous jolt in his chest. He was just able to see Aravali’s Oldsmobile across the front of the property—and the doctor was still patiently seated in his car right now.
And, the sound of the car door had come from much closer—from the right of the front door, just outside, the area where his parents always parked.
Amory swallowed painfully, taking a deep breath and forcing himself to walk toward the front door, feeling a spiraling anxiety shooting up and down him as he did.
Aravali remained in his car—though now, he was staring at his side mirror interestingly, watching as two people emerged from the other vehicle that had just pulled up.
Right beside the front yard—a blue and wood-paneled Suburban had just parked there, its engine having just shut off, and a couple of people stepped out from the driver and passenger seats of the large vehicle.
Joseph swung the driver door shut and reached into his thick black jacket, pulling out his pack of cigarettes and lighting one. He wore a matching black hat atop his dark, graying hairs, slicked back behind his ears, his hands covered with gloves to combat the chilly December air. He was not as muscular or stocky as he had been long ago, though he was still a bigger gentleman, with a slight beer gut and a hint of stubble along his jaw, his face somewhat aged, but not dramatically so. After shielding the lighter from a gentle gust of wind, he lit the cigarette and stuffed the lighter away, exhaling a smoke cloud and strolling around the vehicle.
Candice was on the other side, hunching in the back seat and collecting a few bags of groceries. Contrary to how she often used to dress in the 70s—she now wore a nice blue dress that reached well past her knees, a tightly-fitted dark blue jacket over it, and a dark, silvery scarf around her neck, her black hair tied back in a low, thick ponytail and leaving her wavy bangs to tent over her eyes. She struggled to grab a hold of all the grocery bags, and Joseph stepped to her side, grumbling at her and swatting her away as he tried to carry some of them himself.
“I’ve got it,” Candice assured.
“Uh-huh… just like you got a goddamn back sprain the last time you tried to carry all that shit in there,” Joseph griped, pinching the cigarette between his teeth and pulling a few bags out of the Suburban with both hands. “Don’t give me no lip, now. Just go and unlock the door. You did lock it, right?”
“I thought you locked it,” Candice replied, straightening up and adjusting her grasp on the bags in her hand. “I hope you did, ‘cuz I didn’t.”
Joseph paused and slowly turned his head, raising his thin brows at her.
Candice laughed at the caustic look on his face. “Sorry.”
Joseph sighed and shook his head before resuming his task of lifting bags out of the back. “You are a goddamn mess, I swear to God…”
“Hey—don’t swear to God,” Candice chided, slapping him lightly on the arm. “God has been very good to us.”
“Mhm…” Joseph mumbled disinterestedly.
“He has ,” Candice insisted. “He got you sober, and he put Amelia in the right place at the right time, and that’s how we found the perfect therapist. It all came together.”
“P’shit… not for her,” Joseph laughed, standing and holding grocery bags with one hand, using the other to remove the cigarette from his mouth. “Therapy didn’t do that girl no damn good.”
“Well… it doesn’t work for everyone,” Candice admitted, flicking him on the chest. “But it worked for us . So be happy .”
Joseph grumbled something incomprehensible, and he stepped aside, allowing his wife to swing the door shut.
Then, just when the two of them turned and started marching toward the front door—they both stopped, seeing another person standing outside of their front door, staring back at them.
Amory remained still, gazing across the gravel patch, his eyes locked into them, several things rising up inside, but he didn’t move, react, or speak. He merely stood, feeling a spark of nervousness like he hadn’t felt since childhood, staring at these two people and feeling almost perplexed by their existence. He’d spent so many long years training himself to forget them, erasing them from his mind—he sat on a grassy hill in 2025, gazing into their tombstone—and yet, here they were, Candice and Joseph Evervale, directly in front of him, both alive and well.
Candice and Joseph returned his stare, each of them expressionless.
The longer they stared—the harder Amory’s heart began to pound, suddenly anxious about whatever they would say, or whatever they would do. He couldn’t imagine what they felt now, or how angry they might be with him. The longer the silence became, the more he began to anticipate Joseph angrily snapping at him, ordering him to leave, Candice standing passively by and saying nothing as he did.
But—neither of them moved to speak, and neither one looked ready to yell or put on a face of apathy. They were simply ogling him as if they couldn’t believe their eyes now.
So, Amory took in a breath, somehow managing a smile and giving them a single, simple wave.
“Hi,” he said meekly.
The moment his soft, melodic voice met her ears, Candice’s expression seemed to fracture, her lip making a quiver, gulping and making a light shake of the head. Her big, shiny eyes—the same as her son’s—began to glisten with a watery shine, and her groceries fell from her hand, hitting the gravel beside her feet.
She suddenly broke into a brisk stride toward him—and she snapped her arms around him in a viselike embrace, clinging onto him as if she would never let go.
Amory felt immediately shocked and unprepared for several things at once; he hadn’t expected her to react so lovingly, and he hadn’t expected her head to be nuzzling into his neck, as he was apparently taller than his mother now. He hadn’t expected her to carelessly drop her groceries to the ground—and most of all, he couldn’t have expected Joseph Evervale to be standing across from them with a small, subtle half-smile forming along his face while he puffed on his cigarette.
All at once—Amory felt as if a dam had broken inside of him, a flood of things ambushing him, and he found himself hugging her back, clutching onto her tightly and sealing his eyes shut, choking out a sobbing sort of laugh and feeling a kind of contentment he never knew possible.
He couldn’t believe they were happy to see him…
But he felt entirely grateful and delighted that they were.