Above the Vaulted Sky - Page 38

            This time the curtain moves aside a lot more easily. It’s as though I’m stepping back over the threshold of a door I’ve left open. Short, well kept lawn becomes long grass, heavy, still London air becomes clear country night, and the darkness above flickers into a million, billion stars.

            I take a deep breath and relish the silence around me. The sound of the alarm still rings in my ears and I don’t look forward to returning later that night.

            I practically sprint across the field and through the gate. I slow to a walk when I reach the gravel, not wishing to disturb Yates inside.

            I find I’m fearful of what I may find. What if I’ve left him too long? Everyone deserves a chance at happiness and I know there are things that I want to show him. Thinking about the book passing through the glass at my touch makes me wonder. Can I take Yates with me wherever I go? Can we step through the curtain together? Maybe we can find something that will turn his death around.

            Because it is clear that the man was depressed. His repeated reference to sadness in his life, his shutting himself away in a house in the middle of nowhere, the eternal cutting short of sentences and one-word conversation killers. Here is a man who is not used to company, and he cried out for it in life. It appears he continues to in death.

            So I’ll give him company, and bring him something that may bring a smile to his eternally aging features.

            I reach the door and take a breath, tucking the old book under my arm. Taking heed of his previous words, I raise my hand, pause and then give three sharp raps on the green front door. I marvel at how simple it is to touch an object, and how similarly easy it is to pass through it. The world obeys my thoughts. It settles me. I am finally finding an affinity with my new body.

            ‘Yates!’ I call. ‘I’m not going to leave until you open the door! I have something you’ll want to see.’

            The silence around me is all the reply I get.

            I close my eyes and reach out into the house. There he is, in the hallway, paused again, but different. The darkness has grown, and he feels different. I’m wondering if it’s the same person at all when there is movement and the door flies open in front of me.

            ‘I don’t want to tell you again,’ he says. I see the sparse fuzz on his upper lip and thick black hair covering his previously bald temples. ‘Leave me alone!’

            Yates the man is present in his voice. The sharp eyes are still there, but they exist in the body of a teenage boy.