Lloyd slowly opened his eyes.
The soft morning light passed through the cream-colored curtains and cast floating shadows on the wall.
He sat up.
He remained on the bed for a few seconds — breathing, blinking, listening to distant sounds.
His mind was trying to reconcile two realities: one was that endless whiteness, that ever-shifting being, that closed cosmic eye.
And the other was this room.
This bed.
This ordinary morning light.
With slow footsteps from the bed to the mirror beside the wall — the trail of his bare feet on the soft carpet, the rustle of his pajama fabric — Lloyd went and stood before the mirror.
He looked.
Brown eyes.
The same eyes he’d always had.
Not violet.
Just those two ordinary eyes his father had said he’d “inherited from your mother.”
He said to himself: “So it was a dream.”
He sighed.
A deep breath.
And he decided — not to believe, not to disbelieve.
Just to get on with ordinary things.
What everyone does when faced with things they can’t explain: keep going.
Listlessly, he headed to the bathroom.
The white bathroom tiles under the fluorescent light.
He turned on the tap and splashed cold water onto his face.
He stood under the shower for a few minutes — not for cleanliness, for forgetting.
He let the cold water run down from the top of his head, vertebra by vertebra down his spine, each drop carrying away a particle of those images.
When he came out of the bathroom, he wrapped the towel around his waist and went to the nightstand.
Dark walnut wood, three drawers.
He put on his clothes: simple gray pants, a light blue shirt, a uniform-like black jacket.
He put on a little cologne — the cologne his mother had loved.
The same bottle, still half full, 13 years after her death.
And then, his gaze fell upon the nightstand drawer.
Involuntarily.
Not on purpose, not out of habit.
As if someone had pushed his gaze in that direction.
He opened the drawer.
Amidst a heap of scrap paper, dried-up pens, and old notebooks, he found a small velvet box.
The velvet was worn — from how many times Lloyd had touched it, over the years, on nights when he couldn’t sleep.
He opened the box.
His mother’s ring.
A thin gold band, so thin that if you held it up to the light, it seemed almost translucent.
A bluish stone set in the center — not sapphire, not turquoise.
A stone whose name no one had ever told Lloyd.
Only his mother had known, and his mother was gone.
Gently, he slipped the ring onto his right ring finger.
The gold didn’t warm against his skin — it was cold.
But it was a pleasant cold.
The cold of a memory that hadn’t yet become a wound.
— Lloyd smiled.
A small smile, not out of joy, but out of a fleeting calm.
He said to himself: “Today I’m supposed to go bicycling with my father.”
The word “father” felt strange in his mouth.
He hadn’t used that word with such a simple, unguarded tone in years.
He walked down the stairs.
He counted the steps — fourteen steps, as always — and with each step, he tested his right knee.
There was no pain.
Just as there had been no pain in the shower.
Just as all morning, he hadn’t felt any pain in his knee.
He thought: Maybe the weather’s good.
He took a deep breath and entered the dining room.
The dining hall of the Smith mansion — with that long walnut table that could seat twelve but was used by no one except father and son and occasional formal guests — gleamed under the crystal chandelier.
Light reflected off the white china plates and cast small golden spots onto the wall.
Thomas sat at the table.
His breakfast was complete: sunny-side-up eggs, whole-wheat toast, fresh orange juice.
Lloyd had never seen his father eat an incomplete breakfast or eat in a hurry.
Thomas was disciplined even in eating.
Thomas’s gaze fell upon Lloyd.
His face — that always-serious face, with deep lines around the eyes and pressed lips — softened for a moment.
A small smile.
Not those ceremonial smiles he offered guests at parties.
A real smile. Get faster updates on g.com.
“Well, are you ready? Now eat your breakfast, we’ll leave at 9. Let me go to my room first. Come in.”
His voice was calm.
That same calculated calm as always, but without the sharp edge it usually carried.
Lloyd said: “Okay… Father.”
Thomas rose and left the room.
Lloyd could hear his footsteps fading on the hallway flagstones.
Now Lloyd was alone at the table.
He wrapped his hand around the teacup — black tea with a sugar cube.
At that very moment, the door opened.
And Gary walked in.
But not as usual.
His pants were rolled up — so much that it looked like he’d put them on in his sleep.
His suit jacket was wrinkled, not the usual wrinkles from sitting too long, but wrinkles that came from having slept in the jacket.
His eyes were red, with darker-than-ever circles beneath them.
And the way he moved — if you could call this movement — it was as if a truck had run him over and then the truck had reversed to see if it could run him over again.
He sat down on a chair.
Not a normal sitting — a collapse into the chair, such that the wood groaned beneath him.
And then he sighed.
A sigh that seemed to carry the whole world on his shoulders — and it was overweight.
Lloyd looked at him.
He set his teacup on the saucer.
“What’s wrong? Are you tired?”
Gary dropped his hands on the table — a thump not loud, not soft, the thump of someone who has no energy left to thump loudly.
He fixed his terrified eyes on Lloyd.
And opened his mouth.
“S… S… S… i…”
Lloyd raised an eyebrow.
He stared at him for a few seconds.
Gary was still struggling: “Si… Sir…”
“Cut the clowning around. What happened?”
Gary drew a deep breath — a breath that hollowed out in his chest — and pulled himself together.
As if he were climbing out of the bottom of a well.
“Sir… last night I went on a date with Amelia and… I saw Firan.”
The spoon fell from Lloyd’s hand.
The “ting” of the spoon on the floor — that thin, high sound of metal on tile — echoed in the silence of the room.
That same silence he’d sensed that morning, but now it was a different silence.
The silence of shock.
Lloyd’s mouth hung half-open.
He stared at Gary for several seconds.
His brain was trying to calculate: Firan Mire + serial killer + former husbands = where does Gary fit into this equation?
“So… how are you alive?”
Gary clasped his hands together — so tightly his knuckles went white.
“I have no idea myself. My only hope was in God. And a waiter.”
Lloyd frowned.
“A waiter?”
“Yes. He spilled wine on Firan’s dress.” Gary closed his eyes, as if replaying a film in his mind.
“And in that moment, I fell in love with that boy. He’s not dead yet, don’t worry.”
Lloyd stared at him for a few seconds.
Then, with total seriousness, he said: “In my opinion, you shouldn’t leave the house anymore.”
“I know that myself, sir.”
A short silence fell.
Lloyd fixed his gaze on the window.
The drizzle was still falling.
Then he turned back to Gary.
“By the way, Gary, I’m going bicycling with my father today.”
Tea.
He spat out the tea.
Not a small, polite spit.
A full spray — from the back of the throat.
Tea particles dispersed into the air and settled over half the table, on the tablecloth, on Lloyd’s empty plate, and a few drops on Gary’s own face.
His voice was louder than expected: “Whaaaat? Your father?”
Lloyd wiped his hand over his face to remove any missed tea.
“Yes. My father.”
Gary shot up from his seat.
Not a normal getting-up — a vertical leap.
As if the chair had a snake on it.
“The same Thomas who’s always frowning? The same Thomas who, once when I just said ‘Good morning,’ replied ‘What’s good about it?’?”
Lloyd was trying not to laugh.
He was failing.
Forehead, temples, above the lip.
As if he were standing in a sauna.
“Sir, do you know your father once fired a reporter over a question?”
“The reporter was wrong.”
“Sir, his question was: ‘How’s the weather, by the way?'”
Lloyd was losing control.
The smile was turning into a laugh.
“Gary, I agree with you. Poor reporter.”
Gary suddenly lowered his voice.
A whisper more terrified than any scream: “Sir, you want to go bicycling with that man? The same man who, once when I said ‘That’s a nice photo,’ replied ‘Get your eyes checked’?”
Lloyd could no longer hold himself back.
He laughed.
The sound echoed in the great hall — a real, loud, stutter-free laugh, coming from deep within.
Perhaps for the first time in months.
“Gary, I’m in a good mood today. I don’t want you to ruin it.”
Gary fixed his gaze on the door — the main door through which the father had left.
Then he turned back to Lloyd.
“I don’t want to ruin it, Lloyd. I want to survive.”
He stood up.
Walked toward the door.
Stopped.
Turned back.
His face was so serious that if Lloyd hadn’t seen him spitting tea minutes earlier, he could have believed it.
“If I don’t come back, tell Amelia that I…”
“You’ll tell her yourself.” Lloyd picked up his teacup — a cup now half empty, the other half spread across the table.
“Now go take a shower. You reek of wine and stress.”
Gary sniffed himself.
His face showed he regretted doing so.
With the face of a man condemned to death — a man who knows he’s seen the noose but still hopes a miracle will come and an appeals court will convene — he headed to the bathroom.
His footsteps were slow and heavy.
Lloyd was left alone.
He sat at the breakfast table.
The tea had gone cold.
His gaze fell to the window.
The sky was gray — that uniform curtain of dead clouds.
A drizzle was falling.
Droplets slid down the glass, left their trails behind and vanished.
But today, for the first time, that gray sky didn’t weigh heavy on him.
He ran his hand over his mother’s ring.
The gold under his fingertips — cold, smooth, indifferent.
He said to himself: “Maybe today will be a good day.”
He paused.
Breathed.
Gave a small smile.
“Of course, that’s if Father doesn’t decide to ask about my math grades halfway through.”
He glanced down the hallway.
The sound of water came from the bathroom.
And beneath the sound of the water, Gary’s groans:
“God… just one day… just one calm day… without death… without Firan… without Thomas…”
A thud sounded — as if Gary’s head had hit the bathroom tile.
Then silence.
Then another groan: “It was my own fault… I shouldn’t have gotten drunk… I shouldn’t have gone out with Amelia… I shouldn’t have been born…”
Lloyd smiled.
And suddenly, in the midst of that smile, something stirred in his mind.
It wasn’t a thought.
It wasn’t a memory.
A simple attention.
A silent awareness.
The smile vanished from his face.
He narrowed his eyes.
He took his hand off the ring.
He sat — still, motionless.
And then, in a quiet voice, so quiet it was as if he were speaking to himself —
“Wait…”
A pause.
“My knee doesn’t hurt.”
To be continued…