CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
July 4, 2010
Evening
After two and a half eternities spent hovering in the intangible tension, Calvin felt something collapse at last from within the door that held Cleo. He fell forward from where he’d knelt, paralyzed from doing anything until the door’s magic had run its course. Mrs. Seabrook stood beside him, her head bowed and her hands clutched together. The fireworks continued to dust the sky, but they were just spasms of light that trickled through the fringe of his awareness.
Calvin clawed at the door’s stone symbols, feeling his fingernails tear.
How could I be so selfish to not notice you wanted this for yourself?
A massive gear grated below him in the forest’s bowels. He tumbled backward as the stone door rose. Inside, Cleo knelt with trembling fists f
