SATURDAY

Tump yanked on the handle of his suitcase, cursing when it bounced and refused again to be pulled over the edge of the curb.

He'd bought the thing just two years ago anticipating that he would be using it on tarmac and smooth paved road, but here only the few ancient streets radiating out from the town square were properly maintained and without cracks liable to destroy a wheel. The majority of the population who lived outside of the central district had to make do with a century old cobblestone and cracking asphalt, and as he was currently experiencing, extremely discriminatory curb heights.

A bored looking calico cat came strolling up the street and cast an aloof glance at him before walking on, disinterested.

The last thing he wanted to do was break the handle or god forbid a wheel, so Tump sighed and heaved his luggage up awkwardly by its sides instead, finally overcoming the first obstacle his old home town had thought to throw at him. Without a doubt there would be more: it was the kind of town that was built for certain people and certain people only. His aunt and he had moved as far away as they could afford to when he was barely 15 because it had been becoming increasingly clear that neither of them could stay much longer without suffocating.

As though the heavens themselves were mocking him, the day the prodigal son returned to quaint and quiet Lake End was bright and beautiful with nary a cloud in sight.

Tump's suitcase rattled over the Abbots' polished stone garden path and brushed against the colourful heads of flowers leaning over the edges of their beds to see what all the fuss was about. It was a beautifully maintained garden, positively picturesque, and he selfishly despised its creator for finding such fertile ground here, where there had been nothing for him but gravel in the scrapes on his knees and the judgemental glares of senior citizens. In his memory, the garden belonging to Rin's house was a perpetually yellowing expanse of grass, shaded only by a single ailing pear tree and the house itself: a lone gnomon whose enormous shadow moved unerringly over the lawn as they whiled away the hours.
The red speckled stone the porch was fashioned from clashed with the colour of the path; the effect enhanced by the ornamented clay pots to either side of the door which held plants too fussy to be allowed to grow in the ground.

Tump rang the doorbell and attempted to smile, then when that failed not to scowl. The Abbots could likely guess that he didn't want to be here, but he didn't have to make them uncomfortable too.

It was Rin's mother who answered the door, bright eyed and lively as he remembered her. She extended a hand as though to shake his, but quickly changed direction to grip his arm instead.

"Hey Miss Abbot," he intoned dutifully, and they executed the typical rituals of reacquaintance as he was ushered in and shed his trainers in the entryway.

Barely a minute later, he found himself at the kitchen table with a slice of plum crumble in front of him. Like many women of her age, Miss Abbot was socially insulated by her padded cell of marital bliss and desperate for someone new to talk to. Thus, Tump learned of the new barbershop which had opened behind the city hall, of Marianne finally disbanding her book club, and of the terrible fate which had befallen Anne's pink hydrangea bushes down the road after the recent rains.
The cake was good so he sat patiently, making inquisitive sounds at the appropriate times and stuffing his face. He'd not had time to eat more than a sandwich this morning.

The early afternoon sun glinted off the fake marble countertop they sat at and revealed the dust dancing over the collection of marmalade glasses on the windowsill. The layout of the house was familiar to him still, but the kitchen looked to have been redone entirely in white and wood print, replacing an outdated monstrosity of gaudy powder blue. It was an understandable change.
There had once been a teal dogbed in the corner, but its owner had long since passed away and not been replaced.

Noises from upstairs made them both look up, and Tump caught the eye of Rin Abbot, standing by the banister in a yellow sundress and looking down into the kitchen. When he waved at her tentatively she nodded back.
Her mother called for her to join the two of them, but she rushed past them and out the door with a feeble excuse and not a sideways glance. Tump watched her hasten down the path to the street through the kitchen window until she disappeared behind the neighbour's hedge. They had been best friends once, but he had unknowingly disbanded that friendship when he left.

- - - - 𓆦 - - - -

The Abbots had a dinner date for the evening, so Tump was shown to the multiple aluminium foil covered casserole dishes in the fridge. Although she had already done so over the phone, Miss Abbot apologized profusely for their rudeness even as her husband and daughter began throwing unsubtle glances at the clock that hung in the entryway.

Mister Abbot was not a man of strong convictions, but friendly enough. Unlike his wife Tump hadn't really known him as a kid because his commute to work had been so long he'd left too early and returned too late for his daughter's friends to encounter him much outside of birthday parties. Nevertheless, he remembered Tump well enough, asking after his aunt as he hauled his suitcase upstairs.
He had sort of hoped that no one would remember him, but clearly it was not to be.

Once they'd left, Tump tried his luck with the microwave. His reheated baked pasta came out a little dry, but it tasted good anyway. He hadn't brought much to do other than his phone and a diary, so once restlessness seized him he resolved to explore the house.
There was an assortment of postcards and photos pinned to the fridge, almost painfully cliché. His and Silicia's fridge at home served as a canvas for his aunt to show off her novelty magnet collection, but neither of them had ever gotten a postcard, let alone felt like looking at their own stupidly grinning faces every time they wanted a snack.

Just as it always had, a curtain in the back of the kitchen hid a nook with the basement door and assorted cleaning supplies. It had been an awful place to hide because of all of the dust, but he could recall Alec wedging himself behind the vaccum there once anyway. It had taken the seeker an eternity to find him that day, because none of them even wanted to touch the curtain. There had been a cobweb in his hair when he'd finally emerged, and his mother had scolded him badly for getting his shirt dirty later, but he'd held that victory over their heads for weeks.

The living room looked much like he remembered it, although the tv had been updated to a flat screen and the sagging brown couches looked even saggier and browner. The bathroom, too, had barely changed at all, and the upstairs hallway especially looked like it had been pulled straight out of his memory. The most significant difference was that he was now viewing it all from a higher angle.
It was uncomfortable being here again, in the living ghost of the meagre parts of his childhood that had been good. Although it made him feel worse, he tried very hard to be a stranger here. Returning always seemed to carry the possibility of staying - and Tump would not be staying.

To distract himself (or out of obligation, if anyone asked) he called Silicia. She picked up almost immediately, sounding a bit tired but happy to hear from him.

"Yes," he reassured, "I got here just fine."

"I'm glad - you know I was worried with the recent weather."

Tump nodded and sat back down at the kitchen table. Sitting in the living room alone didn't seem appealing.
"I actually did pass a few flooded areas, yeah. Not too bad here, though. Most of the town is high enough up, I guess."

"And the Abbots? Are they being nice to you?"

"They've always been nice to me Si, you can stop worrying. Are they being nice to you at your conference?"

"Honestly no," she admitted with a pained laugh, "the schedule is a real drag and the mattress is so soft I can barely catch a wink."

"The perfect recipe for sleeping through the day's events," Tump remarked with a smile. They both knew the reason she couldn't sleep really had nothing to do with her hotel bed. His aunt had taken off for Madrid two days before his own departure, where she would be giving a lecture on design guidelines for educational tools on behalf of her think tank. She would rock the presentation, of course, but had always been kind of an overthinker.

When she started recapping the talks she'd heard so far Tump made his way upstairs to start unpacking. The Abbots' spare room might as well have been a hotel room for how welcomingly plain it was, with a white Ikea closet and bed frame and little paintings of flowers on the wall. Most of the room was taken up by the bed, so that once open, his suitcase neatly blocked the way through to the window.
It was no matter. He drifted off that night to the sound of insects chirping outside and slept like a rock.

- - - - 𓆦 - - - -

SUNDAY

He was woken bright and early on Sunday morning by Miss Abbot knocking on his door to call him to breakfast. Tump allowed himself a moment of self pity before he got up to endure the important social event known as a family breakfast.

Practically the second he sat down at the table, Miss Abbot was putting a plate of hot toast and scrambled eggs in front of him.

"Did you sleep well?" she asked cheerfully, swinging herself back down into her own seat.

Tump nodded and reached for the butter.

"Much quieter than the big city, I bet," she continued, a wide smile on her face. Rin exchanged a loaded look with her father that her mother didn't seem to notice. Tump did, but he had no idea what it meant.

"You don't have any obligations until tomorrow, right? Maybe you should go visit Cris. I'm sure he'll be eager to see you again."

Tump looked up from his toast, eyebrows raised. He seriously doubted Cris wanted anything to do with him, but hell, he was already here. Might as well start picking at old wounds now instead of later.

"What about you, dear?" Miss Abbot was asking before he could reply.

Rin, chewing, shook her head, then put a hand in front of her mouth before she spoke.
"I have plans already."

Though she didn't scold her, the slight twist of her mother's lips made her disapproval plain.

"The library again?"

Her daughter stared her down as though daring her to push her on it. It positively stank of teenage rebellion.

Before anything worse than a glare could come of the situation, Mister Abbot spoke over his wife and daughter to address Tump.
"Shall I take you? I'm headed down town to Henry's in a bit anyway."

"That would be great," Tump agreed.
The scrambled eggs were a bit runny, but well seasoned.

"Cris is training to take over his dad's shop, these days. Good at it, I hear."

His ears perked up at that. He'd never taken either of the Fletcher boys for the type to hold down a regular job.
"Really? I never thought he'd want that."

"After Alec got into a fancy college his father practically made him," said Miss Abbot, elated at the chance to dredge up old gossip for someone who had missed it the first time around.

"Pansy, dear," her husband chided, "you're making it sound like he forced him; he offered and Cris said yes. That is all there was to it."

Tump nodded and disagreed. Cris had always been possessive, and taking over his father's business sounded exactly like something he couldn't refuse - no matter how he felt about the actual business. A more interesting question was how Alec felt about that.

The rest of breakfast passed in relative quiet, and then Mister Abbot was ushering him out and to a bulky silver car. It could have easily seated 7 people, and all the compartments in the doors were stuffed full. A mostly empty water bottle tumbled out and over his foot as he strapped himself in.
Halfway through adjusting himself into his seat, he thoughtlessly turned his face to the car window only to find something staring right at him. Tump froze abruptly. The creature was a large heron; its strong yellow beak hanging slightly open, ruffled silky grey feathers outlining a powerful neck. It was sitting on the curb, not moving a muscle, one of its rigid orange eyes fixed on him. Staring into its face, he got the eerie sense that the animal saw him and comprehended that he was just as sentient as it was.

The odd moment was broken when Mister Abbot gracelessly dropped into the driver's seat and loudly shut the door behind himself. When Tump looked back, the bird had lost interest.

Mister Abbot turned the key in the ignition and the radio sprang to life, tuned to some local pop channel. He hurriedly turned down the volume like he was ashamed to have been caught listening to something slightly louder than the background music of a department store.
The drive was fairly uneventful - Tump turned his face away from the window and small talked. It was the performance of his life.

- - - - 𓆦 - - - -

Mister Abbot stopped to let him out in front of Fletcher's on Lake Street and wished him a nice day. The shop looked as it had when he'd last set foot into it; with slightly confusing signage and windows overflowing with a myriad of things he didn't know the names for. They mostly sold tools, screws, work gloves and the like, but also a rich array of chocolate bars, newspapers, hobby paraphernalia and kitchenware. Even as the nearby supermarkets increasingly ate into its market share, old Fletcher's personal connection to the locals kept the place afloat - or so Mister Abbot said.

A small bell chimed as Tump tentatively pushed the door open, and at the counter a guy about his age looked up from his phone. His eyes widened with recognition, then slitted, then widened again. Age had turned his girly jawline handsome and improved his fashion sense, but his slumped posture looked just as it had at 14.

"Hey," Tump said awkwardly.

"Well damn. Look who's back."
Cris leaned forward on the counter, leering at him with a mixture of resentment and - pleasure? Why was he smiling?

Tump walked up to the counter doing his best not to bump into any displays and took a seat on the barstool by the counter magazine rack as Cris' nod indicated.

"I'm here because we're redoing the house," he volunteered. His personal business had probably made it two towns over by now, but he could see in his estranged childhood friend's eyes that he would appreciate hearing it from him.
"Should only take a week or so."

"Hm," Cris said, propping his chin up on one fist and eyeing Tump like he was deciding what to do with his impromptu visitor.
"Picked a good week. Probably no more rainstorms until the end of the month."

"Yeah," he agreed, "I was actually supposed to be here last week, but..."

"Hard to redo a roof in pouring rain," Cris finished for him.

A beat of unfortunate silence passed between them. They didn't use to have problems like this, but they were severely out of practice in talking to each other after all these years.

"I hear you'll be taking over Fletcher's?" Tump asked eventually. The inside of the shop was joyously unfamiliar to him, mostly because of how limited and unpleasant his experiences with Cris' and Alec's family had been back then.
He'd sat on this stool before, but it had all smelled different in that time.

Cris tipped his chair back, pillowing his head against his hands casually, and fixed his eyes on the ceiling.

"Yep. Someone has to."

"You didn't want to?"

He frowned, looking puzzled like he'd never thought about it. That made Tump smile - it was an expression Cris often wore in his memory. His thoughts didn't always follow the same lines others' did.

"Suppose," he finally said.
"Had to be me since Alec did a T----"- his eyes flicked down again to see if the hit had landed. It had.

"Tump," Tump corrected icily.

"Yeah, yeah."

He got up, ready to walk out, but Cris tipped forward quickly to take his wrist.
"Woah there. Calm down, it's not a big deal. You are who you say you are and all that, man."

Tump pulled free from his grasp but sat back down.

"We're all still angry at you, but for what it's worth, I'm glad you're here."

That was a level of honesty Tump frankly hadn't anticipated. He rewarded it by pulling a grimace and dropping the issue.

"I'm not staying," he said, unsure of the reaction the declaration would provoke.

Cris laughed.
"I would have been surprised!"

"Don't you like it here?"

"Eh," Cris said vaguely. "I've never lived anywhere else."
Pensively, he scratched at a scab on the side of his neck. Then a thought seemed to strike him.

"Hey, how busy are you tomorrow night?"

"Not very?" Tump ventured, eyebrows twitching up in suspicion. As a kid he had devotedly practiced raising only one of them in the mirror, but he'd never been able to produce a difference greater than a few milimeters.

"Well, when are they done at the house usually? You're staying with Rin aren't you?"

"Uh," he said, himself wondering when they would be done. "Probably around six?"

Cris' head tilted from side to side as he thought, until finally he unceremoniously concluded, "yeah, that'll do."

"Do for what?"

"You'll see, you'll see. Have some patience, boyo."

He grimaced again, but Cris didn't seem to care.

"In the meantime, can I interest you in the newest model of fishing rod we just got in? Brilliant grip. Couldn't break it if you tried to pole jump with it."

Tump rolled his eyes and let himself be distracted.

- - - - 𓆦 - - - -

It was surprising how much they had to talk about, especially because they hadn't been as close as kids to each other than to the others in their little group. Maybe that made it easier now.
Before he knew it, Tump had spent nearly the whole day in Fletcher's, occasionally being introduced to the customers who came in. They were the only shop around that was open on Sundays, so the things people came to buy ranged from worrying to comical.

He'd just gotten up to excuse himself because he'd have to be back at the Abbots' for dinner, when Cris stopped him again.

"Have you been to see Lia yet?" he asked a bit too brightly, like it was something vital he'd only just remembered. Tump couldn't really see the urgency in it.

"No?"

Cris bit his lip.
"Be careful with her, yeah? Just because you became a guy for her doesn't mean she's not still super pissed at you," he said with what seemed like genuine concern. Tump's jaw hit the floor.

"I didn't- What?"

"Sorry," Cris backpedalled immediately, "I didn't know if you were still into her-"

"No, what? No! I didn't become... What the fuck Cris?"

Cris shrugged and rolled his eyes like he wasn't bothered in the least by Tump staring at him like he'd grown another head.

"I'm just trying to help man."

"God," Tump said, running a tired hand down his face. "Fuck you, man."

When Cris threw a chocolate bar at him, he ducked out the door, still absolutely bewildered. How was he even supposed to react to something like that? Was that what they all thought? Oh god.

Unlike the inside of his head, Lake street was quiet that Sunday evening. The flat land and low houses of the town meant the sun remained visible for a long time, and its light glinted off discarded candy wrappers between the cobblestones and gaudy iridescent garden decor and fell right into Tump's eyes.
If he continued down to the far end of Lake street, it would faithfully take him to the lake for which it and the whole town were named. He shuddered involuntarily and turned into Mulberry road. If he never laid eyes on the damn lake again it would be too soon.

He'd learned to swim there.

(the water weighing him down, Tump gasped as he went under, his shoes soaked heavy, a hand cruelly digging into his scalp, the silt thrown up by the struggle stinging in his eyes, an ever increasing burning in his lungs-)

As guilty as he might have felt for leaving his friends behind, Tump would never apologize for letting Silicia take him away from this place.

As the worn down cobble transitioned into a red brick road, he looked up to see a gap in the line of single-family houses that stood edge to edge along every street here like perfect teeth. The small property was bordered by literal white picket fences, but itself held only an overgrown meadow of wild grasses and stinging nettles. He was taken aback to realize that beyond it, what looked like an unending mosaic of orange was actually the sky reflecting off of flooded fields. Suddenly he understood far more intimately why everyone wanted to talk about the weather here: a good chunk of the population's livelyhood here was at its mercy.
He frowned and walked on, finally passing the dying hydrangea Rin's mother had mentioned yesterday. The pink petals were still green in some places, but in others were turning a soggy brown like they were rotting right off the stem. Gross.

The two crows which sat on the roof of the Abbots' house watched him interestedly as Tump followed the alluring scent of frying aromatics into the kitchen, where Miss Abbot commanded him to go freshen up before dinner.

Mister Abbot had returned by the time the kitchen table had been set, the beginnings of a sunburn reddening his nose and cheekbones.

"Did you enjoy the sunshine, kids?" he asked boisterously, and Tump had to stifle a laugh into his hand.
Miss Abbot, however, took him completely seriously, and disapprovingly remarked that judging by their complexions, 'the kids' had probably spent all day inside.

"Guilty as charged," Tump said when it didn't seem like Rin would deign to reply at all.
"Cris makes for a better shopkeep than I ever could have imagined."

"Oh, doesn't he!" Miss Abbot agreed enthusiastically, heaping pasta onto her husband's plate. "Having a proper job has been good for him, that little rapscallion."

"So what do you do these days, when you're not supervising construction sites?" Mister Abbot asked.

Tump could feel Rin's eyes on him and hoped he wasn't suspiciously reddening. He'd really rather not talk about it actually.

"I'm uh, I'm studying IT."

"IT!" Miss Abbot exclaimed and he ducked his head. "It's a gathering of academics under my roof."

Mister Abbot, who did something important in finance, laughed awkwardly. Before an uncomfortable silence could descend, Tump gathered himself to ask: "What are you doing now, Rin?"

She blinked at him in surprise.
"I'm working under Doctor Ndara until I can afford to study to be a vet myself someday."

Her mother beamed at her with pride and Tump allowed himself a tentative smile.

"That's great," he said, and broke off mid comment about her being good with animals when the lights suddenly died.

"Oh- not again!" said Miss Abbot over the groans of her family.

"Does this happen often?"

"More often than not, recently," Rin volunteered and her father hummed in agreement.
"It's an old house."

"Is it?" Tump inquired doubtfully. Like every house on Mulberry road, it didn't look like it had been built much before the 60s, which by house standards really wasn't very old at all.

"Old enough," said Rin, just as the lights flickered back on. Behind her the fridge resumed its steady hum.

- - - - 𓆦 - - - -

Tump was much less tired that night, so he lay awake a long time listening to the wind rustling through the trees behind the house and the crows screaming at each other outside. He'd almost drifted off when an odd noise joined the cacophony: it sounded like furniture being rearranged, or perhaps the beams in the roof dragging against each other. When he blinked his eyes open again at the noises, a faint warm glow from the front garden lured him to the window.

Rin was sitting on the stone bench in the corner, a gas lantern next to her and a book in her lap. After watching the wind toy with her dark hair for a moment as she read on, Tump decided that he was too tired to wonder about what she was doing and went back to bed. It wasn't his business anyway what people did in their own gardens.

- - - - 𓆦 - - - -

MONDAY

He got up bright and early on Monday morning and was intercepted in the hallway by Miss Abbot in a floral bath robe, who informed him that he could find the lunch she'd packed for him on the kitchen table. Then she disappeared back into the master bedroom - Tump reflected that she must have heard him leave his room. The upstairs floors were surprisingly creaky, much more so than he remembered them being. He supposed the house really was aging.

It was nice to have something very clear to do. The morning was beautiful, sparrows chirping in the hedges and dew shining in the grass. And Tump had nearly a full day of no awkward encounters with his past ahead of him to look forward to.
His feet knew their way, steering him steadily towards the house he'd grown up in. It was clothed half in scaffolding and half in the dust and muck the construction had kicked up. The front garden was littered with metal rods of differing lengths, hefty paint cans and torn up fleece, and a loose sheet of left over insulation material sat in the gravel path up to the door, fat with rainwater like a giant sponge.

Tump picked his way through and bravely unlocked the front door. There was nothing to fear: the house he stepped into was a different one alltogether from the one he'd grown up in. All furniture and decor had been cleared out, the screw holes in the walls smoothed over and the doors replaced. Experimentally, he opened the livingroom window. It obeyed without protest, its shiny new hinges perfectly fitted and the chips in the frame gone. The transformation was almost like magic, although it left very noticeable debris behind as evidence of the labour that had gone into giving a clean slate to this haunted house.
He wiped his hands on his jeans and went to wait outside for the workers to arrive, humming a pop song he'd heard on the radio yesterday.

- - - - 𓆦 - - - -

Rin's parents were drinking wine on the bench in the front garden when he returned in the evening, hungry and with dust in his hair.
They gestured for him to head on in as he passed, winking conspiratorily. Tump frowned, but the mystery was cleared up as soon as he opened the door.

There was a low but steady murmuring coming from the living room. When he peeked in from the hallway, he found at least half a dozen Lake End residents about his and Rin's age arranged in a circle on the carpet, humming.
It was hard to decide where to look first: They were holding hands, and some of them had their eyes closed as though very concentrating hard. Multiple candles had been lit in the centre of the ring, a few of them slim ones in actual candelabras, but most squat and short like scented candles, arranged on dinner plates. Before Rin's folded legs sat an open book and a huge carton of salt along with a spoon, presumably for measuring it out.

Tump was granted only a moment to stare in astonishment before his entrance was noticed, and Cris broke the circle as he jumped to his feet.
"Tumpy-man, there you are. I was starting to worry you wouldn't show!"

Rin opened her eyes slowly to regard him where he was still fidgetting in the door frame, looking like she'd just been woken from a trance.

"What... is this?" Tump asked weakly.

"A seance," Rin said evenly. She threw Cris a quelling look, and he obediently retook his place in the circle, placing his hands back in those of his neighbours.

"You may join us if you'd like."

"Uh," Tump faltered, "I was going to..."
He gestured helplessly to the kitchen behind him and Rin nodded, solemn and imperious.

"There is a cake on the counter. Cut yourself a slice and come sit with us."

For lack of any better ideas, Tump ran a hand through his ruined hair and did exactly as she'd said. It was sheetcake, with a layer of custard and sweet, soft pear slices on top.

He settled gingerly into the space they had made for him in the circle and let his gaze wander over the gathered participants.

"Alright. Once again, let us breathe together," Rin instructed, leading by example. It struck Tump as surreal to see everyone clearly taking this so seriously - after just a few breaths, an odd mood seemed to come over them. As the others' postures relaxed, Tump felt only more and more uncomfortable. Which was silly, because he didn't believe in this stuff at all.
By the time Rin spoke again, she and him were the only people in the circle with their eyes still open.

"Lend me your energy," she breathed, and Tump imagined that she might have made a good cult leader in the 70s.
Then people around him began to hum again, and he had to tap into previously untouched reserves of self-control to stop himself from bursting out laughing. If nothing else, it was a good distraction from the feeling of invisible eyes burning into his back.

"Are you here with us?"

Upstairs, an open window rattled in the draft. Everyone but him flinched, but no one spoke. Then the light flicked off, and Tump started to feel a bit queasy. The sugary aftertaste of the few bites of cake he'd gotten the chance to eat before he'd joined the seance seemed to stick his tongue to the roof of his mouth.

"I'll take that as a yes," said Rin under her breath, then louder, "we mean you no harm. We only want to talk to you."

The lights went back on with the slight crackle of electrical discharge, and a few people blinked their eyes open, looking around as though disoriented by where they found themselves. As far as Tump could tell though, nothing had changed. If the electrical failing was, as he'd been assured yesterday, a fairly common occurence, then even the timing of this was easily dismissed. They were just playing children's games.

"Why are you in this house?"

This time Rin sounded more forceful, accusing instead of politely asking. The house was silent except for the incessant buzz of electricity and the wind tangling in the decor outside the livingroom window.
Across from him, Lia caught his eye, her face calm and unreadible as ever.

"Leave!" Rin yelled suddenly, and they all jerked apart in the same instant when the front door flew open, its handle cracking loudly against the brick accent wall of the entryway. Their ring of connected hands had been broken, and the magic of the moment with it. The feeling of unease lifted from Tump's shoulders as an evening breeze blew the sounds of the outside world into the house; birdsong, rustling leaves, quiet conversation and distant traffic.

He noticed that Rin was staring at him with her eyebrows all scrunched together.
"I must not have closed it properly," Tump suggested, because he didn't feel like he had anything to apologize for. Around him, the others picked themselves up off the floor as Rin shut the book with a very final thump.

- - - - 𓆦 - - - -

"So," Tump asked over his second plate of dinner cake, "a seance. Why?"
Most of the people Rin had gathered for her paranormal evening entertainment had left, and it was only the both of them, Lia, and a friend of Rin's called Erik who remained. Together they were absolutely decimating Miss Abbot's sheetcake.

Rin looked at him like he was stupid, and answered the obvious thing.
"The house is haunted."

"The house is haunted," Tump repeated wryly.
"Right. Sure it is."

"Take this seriously," hissed Lia, who was the absolute last person he had expected that from.

"Fine. Let's pretend I agree with your underlying assumptions here - what makes you think talking to it will improve the situation?"

"Well, what do you suggest we do? This is a delicate matter. We can't jump directly to violence without even attempting a peaceful solution," Rin bit out.

Tump was about to say 'you are out of your goddamned mind', but Erik cut in before he could.

"Maybe tonight really was a sign that we need to take more drastic measures. I mean if it won't talk to us, what other options remain?"

Tump pushed his glasses up to rub at his eyes. He hadn't actually slept that well last night and it was catching up to him.

"He's right," Lia determined, and when Rin nodded her acquiescence added, "we'll smudge the house tomorrow."

At that point he couldn't hold his peace on this insanity any longer, so he hurried upstairs and dialled Silicia's number before he said something that would make the rest of his week here even more painfully awkward.

Although he hated to aknowledge it, that night the house seemed unsettled, like something in the air had shifted with their stupid attempt at poking their noses into things they didn't understand. He twisted and turned for what seemed like an eternity, feeling almost feverishly warm and humid tangled in his borrowed sheets. The night air drifting lazily in through the window barely cooled his skin superficially, and he found rest only once he'd given in and rolled onto the unused side of the bed, where he finally fell asleep sprawled out with only a foot and an elbow still under his blanket.

His dreams were not kind to him, replaying moments from the day and his memory and stirring them up with a good dose of unreality. He was woken by the first rays of sun falling into the room, rolled over back onto his pillow, and thankfully got a few more hours of actually restful sleep.

- - - - 𓆦 - - - -

TUESDAY

Tump had another pleasant morning, and his good mood lasted up until the late afternoon, when someone tapped him on the shoulder unexpectedly. He had settled on a stack of boxes which held as yet unused tiles to watch the new roof take shape, and had felt quite confident that everyone he didn't want to see would be busy until evening.
As Tump craned his head back now, he felt a jolt of maybe-panic, maybe-excitement go through him when he saw that it was Lia standing behind him.
She was wearing a cardigan over a soft looking black and white striped t-shirt, gleaming oxfords and a long wool skirt, which made her look very proper, and older than she really was. By comparison, he felt a shabby in his scuffed up jorts and old flannel.

"Hey," she said, her voice smooth and pleasant but utterly devoid of recognizeable emotion. She'd always talked like that, without any tone at all, unless she meant it to be part of the message. Her blankness made her the perfect canvas for strangers to project onto, and scarily good at moving through conversations without ever actually revealing her opinions on the matter at hand. It was why the old ladies at bakesales had liked her so much.
He had been close enough to her once to arrogantly presume to know what she was thinking. He'd fallen for it - his own version of her - although to be fair, for a long time she hadn't bothered correcting his assumptions either.
Now, he was very nearly a stranger again, looking up into her beautiful, blank face with not a clue as to what went on behind it.

"Lia," he said, embarrassed at how much was plain to hear in that singular word.

She sat down beside him gingerly and turned to watch the construction workers as he watched her.

"How are you finding it, being back in Lake End?" she asked finally, only once he'd already become certain she wouldn't be the one to break the silence.

Tump breathed out a weak laugh.
"Honestly? It sucks. But not as bad as I imagined it might."

"So you don't regret leaving us."
Out of left field as it was, she delivered it in the same tone she did everything; even, melodic, almost melancholic. Nonetheless Tump would have bet his life and everything he owned that he was reading that minute wrinkle in her nose correctly: sand she was angry.

He sighed.
"I had to. I can't regret it."

Lia folded her hands in her lap and nodded, not looking at him. The corner of her mouth twitched down, so quickly that he couldn't be sure he hadn't imagined it.

"I thought I'd never see you again," she said quietly, and he looked down at the dust slowly but surely turning his sneakers grey in shame. She nearly hadn't ever seen him again - if it hadn't been for the timing of that conference, Silicia would have been the one to come supervise the whole of the renovation process.

"I'm sorry."

She shook her head.
"You aren't."

When she turned to him, there was a complicated expression on her face; her brows drawn and eyes narrowed but her mouth almost imperceptibly quirked up. He didn't have to guess this time, because he remembered it from their shared childhood, could recall it like a perfect photograph in his mind. It was pain.

When he tipped forward to hug her, she didn't resist, just rested her chin on his shoulder and breathed out, almost a sigh.
"There was no other way," Tump said into her hair, "You guys are the only part of Lake End I ever missed, but it was then or never. You have to understand that."

"You could have written to me," Lia said, unabashedly petulant, and he smiled sadly.

"Yeah. I should have."

But he hadn't. There was no way to explain it now, no way to give voice to the mindless need to sever all ties to this place that he could find in himself, to cut the jagged pieces of his home town out of his head so he could function again. The phantom ache dogged him still, although medication and therapy and not living in fucking Lake End helped.

She nodded. He nodded. They pulled apart, and she turned away again. Tump was near paralyzed by the fear that she would get up now and ironically, he would never see her again. Even if, in his heart of hearts, he still wanted them all in his life, how would they even fit into it, now?
Did it even matter what he wanted when the space he'd left behind was already so filled with everyone's memories of him that he couldn't have wedged himself in if he tried?

"You don't need to write to me anymore."

Tump flinched like he'd been struck, but the serene expression was back on her face as she stood and put a hand on his shoulder.

"I haven't forgiven you either," she said, "but I've made peace with it. No need to reopen old wounds."

Cris' warning had not prepared him for this in the least.
Lia stepped over the piled up tiles and left the same way she'd come, quietly and quickly. Tump shoved two knuckles inbetween his teeth and bit down until he could trust himself not to howl in agony like a wounded animal again.

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