Page 10 of The Staircase in the Woods

“Long,” Lore said. “Red-eye. Plus, after parking on the runway for too long, it was like almost seven hours in that sky chair. How about you?” But even before he could answer, she grinned. “You still hate flying, don’t you? You’re not white as a sheet, exactly, but—”

“More gray,” Hamish offered.

“Yeah. Gray.”

“I like the flying, it’s the constant fear of crashing I’m not into.”

“I have some stuff for that,” Lore said. “For anxiety. Stuff that’ll open you up, clean you out.”

Hamish snorted. “I don’t think ex-lax is gonna help him, Lore.”

“No, I mean—open up and clean out hismind,not his ass.”

They all laughed. It was a good moment. A small respite. Stupid banter felt right. Like maybe theycouldsnap back into place, like LEGO bricks clicking together.

Owen said, “I take some stuff, but um—I probably should keep on my regimen, or whatever.”

They all nodded at one another.

And then—the moment was over. They stood there, sharing air, the frequency between them feeling increasingly dead. Nobody knew what to say.

All around them, the chaos and bustle of the airport exit filled the void.

“Nick is picking us up, right?” Owen said, trying to chip away at the wall of ice that had suddenly sprung up between them.

“Yeah, yeah, I think so,” Lore answered.

“Fucking Nick,” Hamish said, his gaze cast to the middle distance. “Fucking cancer. I can’t even believe it.”

“Fucking cancer,” Owen echoed.

“Fuckcancer,” Lore said. And they all nodded at that, as if cancer itself could hear them and see them agree that it could get fucked. If they’d had drinks, they would’ve clinked them, Owen decided. But they had none, so mostly they just shifted around awkwardly.

Hamish sighed. “He’s young, too. I mean, we’re notyoungyoung, but for cancer? We’re young. I mean, did you think—” But the words died in his mouth before they could come to life. “I dunno. I dunno! I just know a lot of times it’s all the awful shit we put into our bodies—the foods we eat, the sodas we drink—”

“You know, no, it’s also the shit they pump into the air,” Lore said, by way of correction. Owen could feel Lore getting spun up—like one of the turbines from the flight whirring to life. “Not to mention the shit they spew into the water. And the ground. It’s in the plants now. Poison, all of it.”

“Yeah, well,” Owen said, interrupting whatever Hamish was about to say, “I just hope he’s going to be as okay as he can be through all of it. Whatever he needs this weekend, he gets. Right?”

They all seemed to agree to that.

(Though they didn’t really have any idea what that would come to mean.)

And then a beat-up-looking black Escalade pulled up next to them, giving a few short goose honks.Wonk-wonk-wonk.They shared quizzical looks as an old man, maybe in his seventies, got out. The oldguy, with thinning hair and a well-oiled mustache and goatee, stiff-legged over to them and said in what sounded like a thick Russian accent, “You are three, you come with me.”

Again, they shared looks.

“We’re waiting for our friend,” Lore said, confident.

“I am Roman, your driver. Nick. Nick is your friend.”

“Oh.”

“That’s us,” Owen said. “I guess.”

“Cool,” Hamish said. “Good to meet you, Roman. Let’s ride.”

8

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