“Maybe we’ll call this the wheel,” she said as she headed off to the right.
When she came up to the fourth doorway, she stopped. There was nothing special about the steel panel or the jambs around it or the copper knob that glowed like pink gold, but which would, over time, get a patina with handling.
To her, it was the grand entrance to the Promised Land.
And even though she had been here many times, and had picked out the furniture and fixtures, the appliances and the rugs, this time when she went inside, everything was going to be different. Tonight, this wasn’t just a construction site or a place that had to be decorated, it was home.
L.W. squirmed in her arms, and she put him down. Predictably, he didn’t require any time to steady himself, and he didn’t stay with her. He immediately walked away.
She refocused on the door.
The second copper key she took out vibrated from the way her hand shook, and she told herself to get over it. This was the plan. This was the solution.
This was going to be the very first good thing that’d happened in years.
As the lock released and she pushed the door wide, she was greeted by a square room with an oatmeal-colored couch and love seat, an armchair that was taupe and a beanbag that registered somewhere between fawn and dark caramel. The carpet was a deeper cream, the walls were white, and the TV over the electric fireplace was sporting a screensaver pattern of flying toast. Farther in, there was a kitchen done in neutrals and new appliances—not the professional kind, not like in the communal space, but the sort that would go in a regular apartment. There was also a small IKEA table with two chairs,and she already knew that the cupboards were filled with a set of plain dishes, the drawers under the counter had silverware and utensils, and the space under the gas cooktop had pots, pans, and big bowls.
After a long loiter, she had to make herself take a step forward. But that was okay.
Wasn’t it…okay?
Pulling a half pivot, she faced off at the hall that extended to the rear of the residence. That was going to be the true litmus test, and before she went down there, she checked out in the corridor. L.W. had wandered all the way down to the next door. Which was Tohr and Autumn’s. If he’d gone in the other direction, it would have been where Vishous and Jane were going to live.
“Hey, buddy,” she called out. “We’re in here.”
L.W. glanced back at her and then stayed where he was, his eyes regarding her like she was a bug under glass.
“Come here.” Crouching down, she slapped her thighs like he was a dog, and she had a pocket full of Milk-Bones. “Come’re, L.W.”
He didn’t budge, so she let out an exhausted curse and strode down to him. As she scooped him up, she recognized he was getting heavier and had to wonder how the recall thing was going to go when he got so big she couldn’t pick him up and carry him to where she needed him to be.
Back in the living area, she set him on his feet, shut the door, and locked things. At least he wasn’t showing much interest in figuring out dead bolts. Yet.
Now about the hallway. There weren’t any lights on down there, and as she entered the darkness, she knew the layout like the back of her hand, even though it was hardly complicated: First door was the full bath that served the front part of thequarters as well as the smaller of the two bedrooms, which came next. Past that was the primary suite with its bathroom.
When she got to that doorway, she stopped and looked back toward the light. L.W. was standing at the head of the hall, and she was glad he was fully illuminated. Otherwise, he’d have been something out of theConjuringuniverse, a shadow doll come to life—a little boy, this time.
“You want to come down and see where we’ll sleep?”
At the safe house they’d been staying in, she’d kept the child’s bed he’d graduated to in her room still, and it was going to be the same here. And she wasn’t going to even think about when it was time to transition him to his own space.
“Okay, well…I’ll just go in here.” She motioned over her shoulder. “You can come if you want to?”
Of course he didn’t.
Reaching around the jamb, she flicked the switch, even though she could have willed things on.
A twin bed. Which she’d chosen.
She went over and sat down on the soft mattress. The bedding was simple, just a duvet and a couple of pillows, everything white and taupe like the rest of what she’d picked out. She’d wanted the place to be anonymous…as if she were in a hotel. No ties to her past, just a scrubbed-clean present that was going to break the memory-cycling that had always swallowed her whole back at the mansion.
Taking a breath, she glanced to the closet which was nothing you walked in, just a pair of louvered doors and a rod to hang things on. Then she looked back to the door and the hallway beyond.
And the sitting area that was out in front.
And the exit.
After that? She waited. And waited some more.
