Ethan Greywater's Arc

Chapter 15 of 17

Margaret held his hand on the far side of the door. The light was warm. But Ethan looked back once, through the fading glow, toward the haunt he had left. He saw the lake. He saw a cabin on its shore, and a figure sitting on the broken porch. Sammy. His brother had carried the truth alone for too long. Ethan could not cross in peace while that debt still pulled at him. "Wait," he told Margaret. "There's one more thing I left undone." She studied his face, then let go of his hand. "Go," she said. "I'll keep the door open." Ethan stepped back into the cold. He walked to the lakeside cabin. Its timber walls sagged. The roof had caved on one side. Sammy sat on the rotten steps, a worn journal open on his knees. The boy's eyes were hollow, ringed with sleepless dark. He traced the dusty pages with one finger, reading words the two of them had written together years ago. "You still come here," Ethan said. Sammy flinched, then saw him. "I keep coming," he said. His voice was thin. "I read what we wrote. I carry everything you told me. It's heavy, Ethan. You dropped it all on me and left." "I know," Ethan said. He sat beside his brother on the step. "I crossed the door. I was free. But I saw you here, still bent under it. I couldn't leave it that way." Sammy closed the journal. Dust rose off the cover. "Then take it back," he whispered. "I don't want to hold it alone." "I can't take the truth from you," Ethan said. "It happened. You know what I did now. But you don't have to carry it like a weight. You can set it down." He pointed at the journal. "That's not a chain. It's us. The good years too, not just the end." Sammy's hands shook. He opened the journal again, to the first page. There they were, two boys, two careless lines of ink. His mouth trembled. "I forgot the good part," he said. "I only kept the grief." "Keep both," Ethan said. "Remember me whole. That's all I ask. Not as a monster. Not as a saint. Just your brother." Sammy wept then, but it was different. His shoulders loosened. He pressed the journal to his chest and nodded. "Okay," he said. "I can do that. You can go now. I mean it this time." Ethan stood. The guilt that had tugged at him loosened its grip. He had not erased what he did. But he had freed Sammy from grieving alone. That was the last knot. "Goodbye, Sammy," he said. Sammy looked up, wet-faced but steady. "Goodbye." Ethan walked back to the door. The light waited. This time nothing pulled against him. He stepped through clean, and the ache behind him was gone.