Zachary closes the door, wondering how many names have occupied that spot before and how long it has been since the last one. After a few seconds of hesitation he locks the door.
He rests his head against the door and sighs.
This can’t be real.
Then what is it? the voice in his head asks and he doesn’t have an answer.
He shrugs off his paint-stained coat and drapes it over a chair. He makes his way to the washroom, barely taking the time to register the black-and-white tiles and the claw-foot tub before washing his hands and removing his contact lenses, watching his reflection slip out of focus in the mirror above the sink. He tosses his contacts into a bin and briefly wonders what he is going to do without corrective lenses but he has more pressing concerns.
He returns to the blur of velvet and firelight in the main room, kicking off his shoes as he walks, managing to remove his suit jacket and vest before he reaches the bed but he is asleep before he can deal with additional buttons, linen sheets and lamb’s-wool pillows swallowing him like a cloud and he welcomes it, his last thoughts before sleeping a fleeting mix of reflections on the evening that has finally ended, questions and worries about everything from his sanity to how to get paint out of his hair and then it is gone, the last wisp of thought wondering how you go to sleep if you’re already dreaming.
Once there was a man who collected keys. Old keys and new keys and broken keys. Lost keys and stolen keys and skeleton keys.
He carried them in his pockets and wore them on chains that clattered as he walked around the town.
Everyone in the town knew the key collector.
Some people thought his habit strange but the key collector was a friendly sort and had a thoughtful air and a quick smile.
If someone lost a key or broke a key they could ask the key collector and he would usually have a replacement that would suit their needs. It was often faster than having a new key made.
The key collector kept the most common shapes and sizes of keys always at hand, in case someone was in need of a key for a door or a cupboard or a chest.
The key collector was not possessive about his keys. He gave them away when they were needed.
(Though often people would have a new key made anyway and return the one they had borrowed.)
People gave him found keys or spare keys as gifts to add to his collection. When they traveled they would find keys to bring back with them, keys with unfamiliar shapes and strange teeth.
(They called the man himself the key collector but a great many people aided with the collecting.)
Eventually the key collector had too many keys to carry and began displaying them around his house. He hung them in the windows on ribbons like curtains and arranged them on bookshelves and framed them on walls. The most delicate ones he kept under glass or in boxes meant for jewels. Others were piled together with similar keys, kept in buckets or baskets.
After many years the entire house was filled near to bursting with keys. They hung on the outside as well, over the doors and the windows and draped from the eaves of the roof.
The key collector’s house was easily spotted from the road.
One day there was a knock upon his door.
The key collector opened the door to find a pretty woman in a long cloak on his doorstep. He had never seen her before, nor had he seen embroidery of the sort that trimmed her cloak: star-shaped flowers in gold thread on dark cloth, too fine for travel though she must have traveled far. He did not see a horse or a carriage and supposed she might have left them at the inn for no one passed through this town without staying at the inn and it was not far.
“I have been told you collect keys,” the woman said to the key collector.
“I do,” said the key collector, though this was obvious. There were keys hanging above the doorway where they stood, keys on the walls behind him, keys in jars and bowls and vases on the tables.
“I am looking for something that has been locked away. I wonder if one of your keys might unlock it.”
“You are welcome to look,” the key collector said and invited the