Page 50 of Omega’s Fold

On the way out of the yard Caleb says, “Wyatt?”

“Yeah.”

“Are the new calves gonna need the creep feed yet or do we hold off another week?”

“Another week.”

“Okay.”

That is all he says until we are a mile out of town.

Then, looking out his window: “They shouldn’t’ve talked to you like that.”

“Like what.”

“About Mom’s house. Like you were stupid for letting him in.”

“They weren’t saying that.”

“They were.”

I don’t answer. We drive. The fields go by. The Linden site is off to the south somewhere behind the low ridge and you cannot see it from this road, and I am grateful for that, because I do not think I could look at it today.

“Wyatt?” Caleb says again.

“Yeah.”

“I liked him.”

I look at him. He is looking out his window.

“Yeah,” I say. “I know.”

“I just wanted to say it. I won’t again.”

“Okay.”

We drive.

14. Julian

The air inside my apartment is stale. I have been gone two weeks. Everything is where I left it, including the mug on the counter that I forgot to put in the dishwasher. I wasn’t expecting to be gone that long. I thought it was going to be an overnight trip. I was going to meet the omega at the Bureau office and come straight home. So much for that.

I walk through to the kitchen and I open the window over the sink. The first thing I get is a wall of traffic noise off the cross street six floors below: horns, a bus pulling away, then a man shouting at another man in a language I do not speak. Then, under all of it, the bass thump of something being unloaded at the loading bay of the building opposite, the metal gate going up and down and up and down.

No birds.

I had not known I was listening for them until I did not hear them.

I close the window.

There’s not much in the fridge other than a bottle of white. I open the wine and I pour a glass and I drink half of it standing at the counter with my coat still on.

There is no quilt on any bed. There is no second pair of boots by any door.

I finish the wine. I pour another.

I take the suitcase to the bedroom and I lay it flat on the bed and I unzip it. The clothes inside still smell faintly of his house. Not of him directly — I do not let myself think of him directly — but of the kitchen, and stew, and the soap from the bathroom.