Page 38 of Boats, Moats, & Root Beer Floats

She’d changed it.

A figure stood at the far side of an invisible horizon where blue sky met a field of blue flowers. The longer I stared the more I saw. What she had added that hadn’t been there before. The tiny figure looking out, her back to me. But it was aher, and her longing was evident in the way she stood, stoic in the wind, her hair and clothing whipped about as she stood still.

The light smattering of impossible snow that started to fall, back when there was still hope.

Before that shattered.

She’s gone.

My chest squeezed and something popped with the sort of sound that usually heralded a muscle tear.

Instead, I felt absolutely nothing.

Numbness.

This was worse.

I lifted Lindy’s painting, the only part of her that remained in Witnot Castle, and carried it out of the room.

Al shut the door quietly behind me.

Californian air closed around me warm and clammy compared to the cold bone bite of Witnot’s snowy climate. All the same I dressed in my slacks, shirt and cape that, though unusual amongst the staff on a day to day basis the students had come to expect of me. A mistake I drew on from a role from Hollywood, and the attire and persona just…stuck.

A relic of a bygone era, perhaps. Now, I kept that part of me aside, a memory I shared with Al. He placed his journal inside my suitcase three times before I left. Twice I tried to return it to his room where his portrait sat bare; on the third time the cover sat over his painting, and his presence was gone.

I kept the journal, and said goodbye to an empty castle.

The trip home spawned a new set of research papers on the rights of the dead. I might get laughed off college grounds, but I finished the set and sent them off to a journal I knew would be interested in the point of view I provided, if only in the interests of keeping history in the news and highlighting yet another crackpot professor from SoCal.

After this month, I no longer cared about my reputation. There were more important things to work through. Hell, I even paid out the remainder of the original shareholders from the low cost housing initiative I supplemented the day it started to tumble, located near the college and my apartment I rarely used, more often than not sleeping in my office. What was the point ofhaving a home when I had no family to fill it? And so I filled my hours with business instead of love. The housing initiative fixed a small part of that hole for a short time. The original idea was sound, the execution beyond poor.

I rescued the project and construction continued. An email came through at the same time as my phone rang.

“Ras. I told you I didn’t want to speak with you,” I said tersely, clicking on the email and hoping he hadn’t bombed me on two fronts at once.

Dear Prof. Drysdale,

We would be delighted to publish your article on the Rights of the Unspoken Wishes of the Past. I have enclosed a contract for your perusal. Edits will follow the publication schedule below should you like to proceed.

Both eyebrows hiked, I scanned the contract, finding nothing out of place and double checked I hadn’t sent the damn article to a vanity press by mistake. Finding out of place I left the contract open for a second reading and turned my attention back to Ras who was in the midst of a soliloquy he’d obviously rehearsed several times.

“—and formally apologize to the department for any inconvenience,” he finished.

I nodded along like I understood even though he couldn’t see me. “For what?”

Ras paused. “Covin? Did I call the wrong person?” he asked tentatively.

“Not at all. I got the first part,” I lied.

“Oh good. I just wanted you to know it was no harm done. We didn’t mean to upset the town or the people. And the poor woman who owns the castle. Her either…” Ras rambled on as a smile spread across my face.

“Alright, my friend. I have some things to do. All is fine,” I reassured him, a laugh bubbling in my chest.

What the hell did Lindy do?

I dialed the dean’s office. “Frankie. Tell me the news.”

“You have a powerhouse in your corner.” The ancient dean chuckled, the first laugh I had heard out of him in years.

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