back down. “That’s okay; I don’t need to die for my art. I did take some of you singing though, I hope you don’t mind. You can see them if you like. I’ll develop them tonight most likely.”
“You don’t use digital?”
“I’m an old fashioned guy. I like the process of developing the photos almost as much as I love taking them. But anyway, maybe we can use the pictures I got of your sister to help you find her. Something that would give us a clue to where she lives or who might know her or something. I’ll be Cagney, you be Lacey. Fred and Daphne?”
My blank stare must have been a giveaway. He laughed.
“Sherlock and Watson then? Just what is your name anyway?”
“Sonnet Gray. But I get to be Sherlock. I’d better get back to work.” I stand up and wonder if I should shake his hand, hug him, something.
“Goodnight, Gray,” he says. “Stay out of trouble. I’ll bring in those photos tomorrow night.”
I’m so tired when I get off my shift and finish sweeping and mopping and counting the money in the register. Matthias and Harry wait patiently for me, sometimes sitting at their table, sometimes helping me by taking out the trash and wiping down tables. They don’t seem to have noticed my antics from earlier and they don’t seem as though anything is amiss. They didn’t travel with us until about ten years ago and they never knew Rose. They know the story though. All the Lost have stories. By the time I am able to leave the shop clean and ready for opening tomorrow morning, it’s after midnight. I feel bad on nights like this because no one at home can fall asleep without me for fear of traveling on by themselves. No one can sleep until we are all together. Meli will be irritated because I know she has to watch the kids tomorrow, early. We finish walking home in silence and enter our little brown house quietly. I was right about Meli; she shoots me a glare and a tight-lipped goodnight before she shuts her and Will’s bedroom door a little more forcefully than necessary. Prue gets her nightly glass of water and reminds me to run the dishwasher if I’m going to dirty a plate tonight. Dad pecks me on the cheek with his dry lips and absentmindedly settles into the couch with the reading lamp still on. He sleeps there more often than he does in his bed, so I pull an afghan over his legs and switch off the lamp. Matthias and Harry tell me I sang beautifully and they retire for the night to the room they share, whistling I’ll Be Seeing You. Israel is eating soup from a blue pottery bowl in the kitchen and I join him.
“What’s wrong?” He asks. Israel sometimes seems as though he knows me the best. His brown eyes look concerned.
“Do I look that bad?” I joke lightly.
“You look like something bad happened,” he responds, leaning back against the counter.
I look like I’ve seen a ghost, I think. Because I did. Instead I choose my words carefully and speak softly so that my dad, curled up on the couch, can’t overhear.
“I saw Rose today. I know it was her. I know I’m not mistaken. Do you think I’m crazy? Or imagining things? Is it possible that she didn’t stay in that century, that she can travel too? That she’s Lost?”
Israel is silent so long I fear what he will say when he finally does speak.
“I’ve seen my family in the strangest places. Sometimes I’ll turn a corner and I’ll see someone and I’m sure it’s my mother. Other times I stare so long and so hard at someone that their features will start to resemble more and more my father. I see my brothers in every little boy their ages. I always hope that we’ll meet up again one day. It’s good to hope, Sonnet. Hope doesn’t make you crazy. The absence of hope does.”
“You don’t believe me then?” I feel like crying, but I also feel angry.
“Will that make it better? Do you want me to believe?” (In your delusions? is the unspoken ending to his question.)
“Do what you want,” I shoot back. I turn my back on him and rummage through the cupboard until I find what I’m looking for: Nightfall pills. Sleep being so important and vital to coordinate with your group, a Lost man long ago developed Nightfall pills.