The Story

IThe Bedroom

"I told myself I would never come back. Yet here I am, inside her door."

An iron bedstead under a portrait nobody took down, a bare bulb on its flex, and a drawer standing open and empty. Everything else in the room is exactly where it was put down.

IIThe Study

"She wrote to no one. Every letter. Year after year."

Her study — the room he kept for himself. It opens to me now.

A wall of books with slips of paper pushed in between them, and a desk buried under more of the same. The grate is cold. A tree has come in through the wall and made itself at home over the writing.

IIIThe Kitchen

"He weighed out her days in spoonfuls."

The kitchen — where her days were counted out in small tasks.

A cast-iron range gone cold, a long scrubbed table, and two pans still hanging from the beam. The bundles of herbs above the hearth dried out years ago and nobody took them down.

IVThe Garden

"Under this tree, she carved two letters. Then she carved them out."

A walled garden gone to seed, with a swing still hanging on its chains from the old tree. A stone basin, a bench, and an iron gate in the wall that the ivy has almost finished closing.

VThe Greenhouse

"Everything in here was medicine, if you asked the right man."

The greenhouse — what she grew where no one watched.

An iron-and-glass vault with half the panes gone and the ivy coming in through the frame. Terracotta pots stacked along the potting bench, a watering can, and a row of small bottles on the shelf beneath it.

VIThe Well

"What a house cannot burn, it drowns."

The well — the deepest thing this house owns.

A stone well in a walled yard, the rope still wound on the windlass and the bucket still hanging under the pulley. A bare tree leans in over the wall behind it.

VIIThe Chapel

"They prayed over her, and called it care."

The chapel — where the village wrote her down.

Plain pews under a stone vault, a book left open on the lectern, and candlesticks on the altar. One lancet window lays a single bar of light across the flags.

VIIIThe Crypt

"They gave her a stone. The stone is all there is."

The crypt — where they say they laid her.

A barrel vault with empty shelves cut into both walls. The lid of the stone tomb has been pushed off and left leaning against it, and a lantern stands on the flags in the standing water.

IXThe Post Office

"Every letter passes through my hands," he told me once. I thought it was pride in his work.

A whole wall of pigeonholes, every one of them empty, under a lamp still hanging over the counter. A pair of brass scales, an inkwell, one ledger, and a few tied sacks nobody came back for.

XThe Doctor's House

"First, do no harm — unless the harm settles its account."

The doctor's house — where her sleep was prescribed.

A glazed cabinet of bottles and instruments, an anatomical chart on the wall, and a couch with a blanket folded over the end of it. The desk is open, and the book on it is open too.

XIThe Attic

"A trunk, packed and waiting. She was not taken. She was leaving."

The attic — the room above them all, and the one he forgot.

Rafters, cobwebs, and a round window letting one shaft of light down onto the boards. A calendar is pinned to a post, and a banded trunk sits in the middle of the floor with its lock still on it.

XIIThe Nursery

"A room with no door. A child with no name."

A door behind the wallpaper — a room this house pretended not to have.

Chalk houses and chalk trees across one wall, drawn low, with a crescent moon over them. A narrow bed, a rag doll, a tin mug on the boards. The window is boarded.

XIIIThe Basement

"Some doors should stay closed. But here we are."

The cellar door — the last room in this house she went into.

A brick vault at the foot of the cellar stairs. Photographs are pinned to the far wall in rows, and on the ledge below them a line of candles has burned down to stumps.

XIVHis Room

"I read her letters. It is only fair the house reads mine."

His room — the one door in this house I have never seen open.

A narrow bed, heavy curtains half drawn, and a bureau with its lid down and locked. The frame on the wall above it is empty, with the tape still on the glass where something used to be held.

XVThe Winter

"Her footprints stop here. A second set does not."

A field under fresh snow, with one line of footprints crossing it. At the edge of it there is a dark cottage with a single window still lit, and the bare branches close over the whole scene.

XVIThe River

"The ice held her weight. It would not hold his nerve."

The river — the crossing he could not make.

The river frozen over and cracked across, with open black water further up. A plank footbridge still has its handrail, and the tracks in the snow come down to the near bank.

XVIIThe Hut

"Two cups. One night. Ten years of wondering, answered."

A thread of smoke past the far bank — somebody kept a fire that night.

A log hut in the trees with snow over the roof and a stone chimney. Firewood is stacked under the eave, an axe is left standing in the block, and footprints go up to the door.

XVIIIThe Station

"Two tickets, south. Stamped at dawn."

The station — where the rails run out of his world.

A wooden halt with a departures board and the ticket window shuttered. One bench, one lamp, and a single track curving away until the fog takes it.

XIXThe Clearing

"A single tree. A single bell. A single choice."

The clearing — where the moon sleeps, and where she asked me to wait.

Two great trees, and the moon between them. A bell hangs on a cord from one of the branches, and the trunk below it is split open into a hollow.

XXThe Return

"The house is behind me. It is finally only a house."

The road home — whatever home is, after this.

A rutted lane under bare trees, with a five-bar gate at the field and a cottage at the far end of the hedge. The footprints go out across the field and the cart tracks go the other way.