If absence makes the heart grow fonder, then what can be said of their hearts after all this time?
Absence implies presence palpable enough to miss. Wherein words are weightless air so easily drowned out by the slightest sound, he has almost quite forgotten. A reminder, Glen decides, would be welcome now.
He’s put in mind of some ridiculous sugar-spun house. The kind that gives him headaches but he can’t quite share because the meaning of its existence seems to be finding some excuse to crumble. Is he going mad?
Predictably, he tells himself wryly, as the stone walls answer with silence.
If it must be so, he stands a better chance of understanding Jack Vessalius than he’s ever done. Because Jack is good at this, at making every gesture an ornate snare: here is a brand of madness which may be mine, now accept it. It is this thought that eventually locks all its like. Perhaps all the proof he needs is in front of him; Jack can lie this well. Therefore it must be for a good reason that treacherous voice whispers at him surely, someday, a life for a life.
Glen pinches the wicks of the candles by the windowsill and draws the curtains. He stands in the dark, eyes closed.