Kate Bush's Arc

Chapter 11 of 21

Kate saw the paper first. She had tucked it into Will's shirt pocket before they carried him through the oaks. Now the corner showed above the cloth, and the ink of his name was bleeding at the edges. The damp of the glade had gotten into it. She pulled the paper free. The W was still sharp. The last letters were going soft, gray at the tails, spreading into the fibers like a bruise. "It's fading," she said. "Mr. Echo. Look." He leaned across the stone. His face did not change, which was how she knew it was bad. "The box holds his shape," he said. "Not the name. If the name goes before dawn, the shape has nothing to sit on." He looked at the two rabbit ghosts by the stone. They tilted their long heads at the paper and did not speak. They could not, she remembered. Dead too long. The box had their voices now, not their mouths. Kate pressed the paper flat against her palm to keep her hand from shaking. The cat stayed on Will's chest. The collie whined once from the edge of the grass. Ollie crouched by her elbow. "You did it for me," he said. "In the jar. You caught my name in the jar and let it out here." His voice was small and steady. "Do it for him." She still had the jar. She had carried it since the peak, then since the glade, its glass warm through her coat. She took it out. The seal along its lid still held. She held the jar to her mouth and said her brother's name. She said it the way she had said it into the soup pot three years ago, calling him to lunch. She said it twice more, quiet, so the pale woman would not hear it through the ring of oaks. Then she pushed the lid down and felt the seal catch. "Now," Mr. Echo said. "Over the paper. Over his mouth." Kate broke the seal above Will's face. Nothing came out that she could see. The cat's ears flicked. The rabbit ghosts bowed. Will's eyes opened. His hand, the one that was still his hand, closed around the paper on his chest. The letters on it went black again, wet and whole. His outline set. The grass under him stopped showing through his sleeve. He looked at her. He could not speak. He did not need to. From beyond the oaks came a sound like a foot set down on dry leaves. Then another. Mr. Echo stood. He closed the brass box at his hip and did not latch it. "She's here," he said. "He'll hold now. That's what we bought." Kate folded the paper against Will's palm and stood up beside the stone.