Chapter 3 Don’t Come Back
1156 Words
Rafe's Pov
I did not believe in ghosts.
But Kali Voss walking back into my life felt exactly like one.
I saw her through the upstairs window before she got out of the car. She looked up at the house before going inside the way she always used to, like she was taking its measure before it could take hers.
I stepped back from the glass. Went downstairs.
I positioned myself in the hallway because I needed to see her face when she saw mine, and I was not going to lie to myself about that. That ship had gone down, and I had been the one holding the match and I still thought about it more than was reasonable.
She came around the corner and stopped.
"Little Voss," I said.
"Don't," she said.
Seven years. One syllable, that was us in full.
I fell into step beside her because standing still was not an option when Kali was in the same building.
"You look different," I said.
"I am not."
"I did not say it was a compliment."
"I did not take it as one."
She was sharper. Or I had spent seven years softening the memory and here was the real version, walking fast and not looking at me more than she had to.
I spent the afternoon trying to find things to do that were not standing near whatever room she was in. I fixed a latch on the terrace door that had not needed fixing.
I took the long route to the kitchen three separate times. I had a conversation with a member of staff about the garden that lasted twelve unnecessary minutes.
None of it worked. She was in the house and I could feel her the way you could feel the weather changing.
I had not expected it to still be like this.
At dinner, I watched Adrian watch her. Watched Ethan watch Adrian watch her. I was the only one watching all three of them and none of what I saw sat comfortably.
Adrian asked her about her writing and she answered him with the particular directness she had, not aggressive, just clear, and I watched his face do something it almost never did. It opened. Just slightly. Just enough to confirm what I had already suspected.
Ethan did not notice.
I noticed.
I also noticed the way Kali noticed. She saw Adrian's attention and she filed it. She did not react. She did not pull away or lean in or play with it. She just cataloged it the way she cataloged everything, quietly, and kept moving.
That was what she had always done. She moved through difficult rooms like she was just passing through them.
I had always respected that about her. I had also always resented it slightly, the way she could make everything look manageable when I knew very well it was not.
After the plates were cleared, I poured myself another drink and watched Ethan watch his father watch Kali leave the table. Three separate expressions in one direction. None of them comfortable.
I put my glass down.
I walked the east corridor. Stood in front of the portrait for a while on my own. I had done that before, more times than I would admit. Trying to understand what it meant that she still hung here. That Adrian kept her there.
I heard Kali's footsteps before I saw her.
She stopped when she saw me.
"You came here on purpose," she said.
"So did you."
She looked at the portrait. Then back at me.
"Tell me," she said.
"Tell you what."
"Something true. Anything."
I looked at Elise. At the fact I had grown up in this corridor. The face that looked like the face of the girl standing next to me now.
"Her name was Elise Blackwell," I said. "Adrian's fiancée. She vanished twenty years ago. Nobody talks about it because Adrian shuts it down every time. And nobody knows why her portrait is still here, but it has never moved."
Kali was quiet.
"She looks like me," she said.
"Yes."
"How long have you known that?"
"Since the day your mother brought you here. You were fifteen. You walked past this portrait, and you stopped, and I watched your face, and you looked confused, and you asked who she was, and your mother pulled you away before I could answer."
"I do not remember that."
"I know." I turned to face her. "That is one of the things I can not explain to you yet."
She looked at the portrait for another long moment. "What happened the last time I was here? My memory has clean gaps."
I looked at Elise instead of her.
"There are things I can not tell you right now," I said.
"Can not or will not."
"Both."
"Rafe."
"I know." I turned to face her. She was closer than I had registered, or I had moved without noticing. With her that was always possible." But hear me. Whatever Adrian offers through this sponsorship, whatever the terms sound like. Read everything. Twice. Has someone outside this house gone over it?
"Why."
"Because he does not do things out of generosity, and you interest him in a way that has nothing to do with your writing."
"You are scared of me," she said quietly.
"Do not make anything out of that."
"I am not making anything out of it." She looked at me with those eyes. "I am just noting that you came here. That you waited. That you were watching that portrait when I arrived."
I did not have an answer for that.
"You should not have come back here," I said. I turned to leave and kept walking. "Not after what happened the last time."
I heard her take a step after me.
"Rafe."
I stopped but did not turn around.
"Whatever happened," she said, "it was not my choice to leave."
"I know that."
"Then stop saying it like it was."
The corridor was quiet. The portrait was behind us both, and I could feel it somehow, the weight of that face that looked too much like hers.
"I am not saying it was your choice," I said. "I am saying that whatever forced you out the first time is still there. It did not go anywhere." I paused. "You came back, and it is still there, and you are standing right in the middle of it, and you do not even know it yet."
She was quiet.
"Then tell me what it is," she said.
"I told you. I am not ready."
"Are you ever going to be ready?"
I did not answer that.
I started walking again. She did not follow this time.
"You should not have come back here," I said. I turned to leave and kept walking. "Not after what happened the last time."
Behind me, I heard her go completely still.
- Writer
