There's an old riddle I tell to the folks who come tired to the halfway house.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHtcT9hBNGG
'How far can you walk into a forest?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUQNpyPaSxY
Some of them know the answer, some don't.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjISozcuYPx
'Halfway. Now take your rest.'
The Wood of White Nights was my home.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVc9m0h0UEb
It was a place between two places where rarely people had a reason to stay. Two poor towns, farming areas, or so they claimed, because the crops always failed and never the baleful cry of an animal I heard.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0kABnH3Ywp
People had their own reasons for passing by the Halfway House, and I had my own reasons to live there.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxxTGc7NRfD
I suppose, if nothing else, it gave me something to do.
It was a hobby of sorts - I had always had a way of talking to people, and at the Halfway House I could learn about a different life every day. All the sadness and - occasionally - gladness that would lead someone to stay at a dying building in a forest full of dangerous beasts.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡY4RCOXdybE
For some, perhaps they were seeking something. Tales of lost treasure in the Woods, or old friends who stopped returning letters or calls. It's strange, really - the people who were looking for something were lost themselves.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7LI6jtF8xk
The House provided refuge for others, a place where the outside world no longer mattered, a place where time itself failed to keep composure, a place where they could escape the judgements and expectations.
And I suppose that for a while it kept my interest. Lives and stories were precious things and the knowledge of each one was like a temporary high of intimacy - something that I could never have achieved elsewhere.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRevoisDHyv
But too soon, I learnt that life was like a loop, a pencil retracing the same track over and over again - I met the same people, the same stories, the same tired faces with eyes of broken promise.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1wWcS6IKHO
There was nowhere else for me then, of course. So I stayed. And with every passing year, I couldn't help but feel that I was looking into the mirror every time I greeted a lost soul into the House. I was running. Away, or to, even I didn't know. But I was running, by staying still.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmY8CXt7Jpy
You see, runners inevitably hit a brick wall. For them, it was death. For me, it was an old friend who returned as a stranger under a rain-soaked sun.
'Welcome to the Halfway House.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbT787zV6w4
The girl was dripping, and the warm rays of light from the sky had done nothing to dry her. She was English - with those perpetual dimples and perceptive eyes - and her hair was dyed an angel white. She was short - and her complexion said that she couldn't have been any older than twenty seven.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIyEicwBpmf
'You must be tired. Sit, please.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxMRGnJRsXC
She remained on her feet, and walked up to me.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrrRDHHUnDq
'Do you know how far you can walk into a forest?' I asked her, seeing myself ask myself the same question from the inside of the droplets hanging at her eyelashes.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1vi9Va6EAn
'Halfway, you bastard. It's me.' The moment that tears began running down her cheeks and not just residual rain was misty, like a watercolor - perhaps she was crying before she even entered.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvlQzZj7Dey
'Aria!' I embraced her, but only lightly, conscious of my suit getting wet. 'You're looking younger than I last saw you.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡh5mz5IVFAE
'Please don't give me that bullshit Al, I'm old. I'm too old for all of this.' She let go, and finally sat down. She never liked being told when to do things.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSRL13WYYlS
'Another one?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡT6uFIReyVR
'What do you think? Of course it was another one.' She pulled out a few sepia polaroids from her satchel and gave a heavy sigh at them before handing the stack to me.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBQ2aZUDDhK
'What was his name?' Aria always picked the ones with the lovely smiles. Here - riding on his back in a park, laughing. Here - him making a mess of the spaghetti. Here - a kiss.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIFhem1lcs3
'Jacob. Jacob Ryans.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3YB3czjoll
'He's very beautiful. You two look so happy together.' Here - both of them asleep on a couch. Here - a walk on the beach with a white dog.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiS80ODANHg
'Were, Al, we were happy.' She collapsed into an outburst of bodily fluid again. Crying, bleeding, orgasming, I never really got the differences. There's always the pain and the pleasure, and at the extremities, they merge into the one - like a great circle of emotions. 'God, Al, I don't know why I keep doing this to myself.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeHVLn3WyjA
'Don't say that. What you do is a good thing. You give these men an extra few years of happiness. You know that all these people would have died if you didn't come into their bodies.' Us Muses could pass into any dying body and grant it with immortality so long as we stayed inside. She was the Aria - the outpour of raw emotion. I was the Allemande - the noble, the detached.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡc9Z7RxhxtO
'But you know what I took away? Closure. And not having that - that hurts more.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡP8rpkkFGqC
'You can still fix things.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDAVNWmo9aG
'Al, you know I can't do that. I can't tell them, I can't leave them in any way. I loved them all. I love them all.' She took the photos back and took a long look at the one by the beach. 'The dog was called Marbles. You like riddles, Al? Why's the dog called Marbles?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUpuSPx0uIk
'You tell me, sis.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡF7Iw1Br1Cl
She laughed. 'He's batshit bonkers. But adorable all the same. We got him from the adoption place in - I don't even remember. But he was heard barking from the sewers. His previous owner left him there.' A corner of the English girl's smile appeared and faded just as quickly like an imprint from the past.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡG4f3tuZkkT
'I just don't know why I keep making the same mistakes.' She folded the photos.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡu1xSiTvBFx
'Well, sis, life is like a loop - '753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDMsDQJaOUI
'Can you just shut up for once, Al? Not all of your goddamn philosophies are goddamn right. You're stuck here for what you've done, how can you say you know about life?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBVyAaC8DmY
I stayed silent. She was in a mood.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKkPtauchQV
'It's like a spiral.' She said, suddenly. 'You always think you're heading somewhere but you just keep going round and round. You know the funny thing about spirals?' I didn't interrupt her - it was rhetorical, and I would only frustrate her further. 'You can draw an infinite number of spirals. An infinite number of lives. They get close, but the only place they really touch is at the center, at the end. At the end of them all.'
Having Aria around was always difficult, but I know she did it for me.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡT4qcBc4VoL
You see - I couldn't actually leave the woods. I had made a mistake, a long time ago. Aria takes photos of the world for me, with an old polaroid that she never found the strength to throw away. After a few decades I had had enough of the cities and mountains and lakes, and I asked if I could just see her life.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡi1RBs69JDs
It was always about the love, for her. I never understood why. But she would purposefully try to find the ones who were in a healthy relationship, the ones whose boyfriends or girlfriends were always by their hospital bed.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ69eA8HwIAR
And once those dying bodies woke again, she would never let those people go, not until she had to leave. She stayed with each one only five, ten years - you see, the bodies don't age once we're inside. To keep us safe, she left before it would become noticeable.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡD5quPqlEjO
I suppose I should have thanked her more than I did.
'You're still here.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKb4gPRvlKK
It was morning, and Aria was sitting, the English girl, in the dining room. She had never stayed longer than the night before. 'I need a break from it all.' She sighed.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHwLvYyj0cZ
'You're at the right place.' I took the place beside her. 'The cornflakes are shit.' I reminded her. 'Have the yogurt.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡupoG1uxRsh
'How did it feel, Al?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7w9EHQxlHO
'How did what...'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ32b9tlXY77
'To do what you did. To do that to all those people.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSY8kWNUihm
'Why are you asking me this now?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDKN0kObXt4
She laid her head into her palms. 'Because nothing has changed.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSJMaj4KIMb
She didn't want to say it, but I knew what she was thinking. She was tired of being trapped in this world with me.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBNjjK9Jfw1
'Sis, I'm sorry.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2ABwMpguQp
She looked up, crying again. 'But were you really?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZkDA2NZMat
I couldn't answer that. One option would be a lie and the other would break her heart.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiVbRmDeTI4
I stood.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡy799uunGpS
'I'll go get you some yogurt.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7CqJ9QV8zb
'Do you ever wish you could die?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡob1zAagpkC
Aria was slowly retreating into a shroud of depression.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHwAbpxdCKa
'No. There's so much to live for.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmgVkc8KVGo
'But I've seen it all. There's nothing left.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmHnrXo6BaA
'Don't say that.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSTjkDDeaDT
Even I was surprised at how much she cried those few days she stayed at the Halfway House. It bothered me. I never wanted to see her like this.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6I37uWA9hK
And it was only then that I decided to do what I knew was possible several, several years ago.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡznTUorzLfz
'Sis... I can get you out.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYpcp8L2O42
'...what do you mean?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlgnCV54Uxv
'I can get you out. I can get you back home. But you have to be patient.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBjv8XD0LBh
'...I don't understand.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKctoClkJaU
'Back home, sis. Away from all of this.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmXVrlGeyCx
'But how?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ82Khl1dENc
The tears had stopped and I knew I had made a promise that I couldn't bear to break.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡU2SRsi3Svy
'You'll understand tomorrow. Sleep on it.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgEtb8zOoN8
She turned away again.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡk9YuJyEM4v
She didn't say thanks - reminding me even now how I had mistreated her before.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡT6bUfFlZmV
'Remember. You'll have to be patient.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQ7cYTNE3f5
I wait a few moments for a response before I close her door.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3SFPKfenqn
It was time for me to leave. To run away, to run towards.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuIXmajdHLS
753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeAQjzmghiB
An English girl with hair angel white, kneeled before the gates of her home.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjWjKGt2gQ2
'Father?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCK3j3HWZxR
'Aria. You know you're not allowed here.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaPVaTONwDF
'It's not Aria.'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbklH1bJjqI
Muses could go only into dying bodies, of which there were none in the Wood of White Nights, where time itself lay tired.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQ2tbMRuQcq
But there had been one - a girl with cancer, who should have died seven years ago, who woke at the brink and came to the woods.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSIATgPdFAT
'Allemande?'753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡz4oDYYbNWh
I could feel him, ready to send me back to the forest in a single spin of the landscape.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0MUB04wFeV
'Wait.' I say.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMjAUA7K0T1
I know what I need to do to make things right. I know what I need to do to pay for my past. I know how to send Aria home.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVhqxO0cXHX
Because I realized, longer ago than I believed, that I was wrong. Life didn't have a simple shape, an order - life was a mirror, in the corner of the universe, in which you could see eternity, and the reflections of a thousand others -753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxRSYITcbNm
And so I will suffer the reflection of the suffering I caused.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9boPdKMz3e
I had been running - not away from the forests in fear, not to the forests in hope of comfort, but to hide from the forests that festered within myself.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeYtIOURfgM
And when all the pain finally ends, they will offer me the heavens once again in forgiveness - but I would stay only a moment to say farewell - and return home, to the Halfway House.753Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwKKpqkkIsi
