“No one visible,” Daniel said when we approached. “We stay together.”
The wind moved through the dry grass with a sound like whispers.
Clara reached for my hand.
We walked toward the observatory door.
It opened before we touched it.
A man stood inside.
For one impossible second, age fell away and he was exactly as memory had kept him: broad shoulders, kind eyes, hair always in need of combing, one eyebrow slightly higher than the other as if he were constantly amused by a thought he hadn’t shared yet.
Then reality returned.
His hair was white now. His face was thinner. A scar crossed one side of his chin. His coat hung loose on him. But his eyes—
His eyes were my father’s.
Clara made a sound I had never heard from her before.
Half sob. Half breath.
“Dad?”
Thomas Caldwell stepped into the doorway.
He looked first at me, then at Clara, and grief rearranged his face.
