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THE NEXT morning was cold and alarmingly still despite the rays of sunlight creeping in through the bedroom window. Still in my pajamas, I walked downstairs to the kitchen where I found Enta fully dressed and ready for the day. She wasn’t cleaning or cooking. She wept at the empty kitchen table in muffled sobs.
“Edgar? Is he—?” I couldn’t finish my sentence. It all seemed so impossible. I’d brought back the recipe and the ingredients. Enta had even brewed the elixir according to Edgar’s own instructions. He should be better. He had to be better.
“He never woke up. Another Hall lost to me,” she moaned. “I was so sure that we had it—that it would work. But, look at me, sitting here idle, not doing a thing of use to him or anyone else. I’m going into town. I need to find someone to help with the burial.”
My head reeled as my eyes filled with tears. Had Enta brewed it wrong? Had she missed an ingredient? I doubted that Edgar had made a mistake in preparing the vials or writing the instructions. He wouldn’t have taken that chance, knowing that Valcas would have tested the elixir to make sure it was effective before letting me go. That was the whole point of my letter, of the lie. It had to be the right recipe.
“But you gave him the elixir last night,” I said. “Why didn’t it work?”
“It was just too late. I have no other explanation. He was too sick and we were too late.” Fresh tears spilled from Enta’s blotchy red eyes as she clambered for the door.
“Do you need any help? I can go with you.”
“No. Thank you, Calla. I just need to do something, need some time—” Enta shut the door, cutting off her own words.
I sat at the kitchen table trying to figure out what had just happened. We were too late? No, not we, I sighed. I was too late. I’d let myself get distracted when Edgar needed me most. I hadn’t been fast enough. And now he was... I just didn’t believe it. I walked over to the room where Edgar was still at rest in the child-size bed. The IV bag was no longer there. Cold and frail, Edgar was as still and lifeless as the silver brook. I opened the window that overlooked the backyard to let in some fresh air. It didn’t help me to breathe any better.
I collapsed onto the wooden floor and wept. Intermingled waves of guilt, sadness, regret and loss overtook me as I thought of what I’d done. I’d lied to a past version of Edgar, a lie that I’d recorded as a writing on a physical object. I’d broken TSTA rules and would be in a lot of trouble. Edgar was dead. I was being doubly punished. Every risk I’d taken, all the pain and regret that I’d felt—I’d done it all for nothing.
“Edgar!” I cried his name as I repeated a litany of apologies that came out in gasping sobs. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” He’d given up the secret of his life’s work under the illusion that he would save me, and yet I had not been able to save him. “I’m so sorry.” Figuring that this would be my last private moment with Edgar, I knelt and reached up from the floor. “I’m so sorry.”
I grasped his hand. It was clenched shut and cool to the touch. His skin felt like tissue paper that had been crumpled into a ball and then smoothed out again. At any other point in my life this would have sent a shiver up my spine. But I didn’t care that I was holding a dead person’s hand. I was holding the hand of Edgar, someone who’d meant more to me than anyone else in the world.
I squeezed his hand. It made a crunching sound.
I froze, then pulled my hand away, hoping that I hadn’t just broken the bones in his fingers.
I stood up out of my kneeling position to take a closer look. A corner of paper poked through his fist where his thumb met his pointer finger. Edgar must have been holding onto something as he died. I gently tugged at the paper, trying not to tear it or disturb Edgar. I jumped back when his stiff hand loosened enough to free what was inside.
The paper was creased and folded many times. I slowly unfolded it and read.
Dear Edgar,
I have no idea how long I’ve been gone, but I’ve run into some trouble and I need your help.
...
It was my letter, the daily reminder that I’d left in his past, a falsehood that forced him to face his obsession with the youth elixir. I crushed the letter in my hands, pressing it into a tight ball. Enta and I weren’t too late to save him. Edgar didn’t die from an illness. He’d lost the will to live. He’d given up his unnaturally long life of solitude. I looked at his withered face. It looked peaceful. Edgar was finally free from the imprisonment of his life’s work.
***
BY EARLY AFTERNOON, a half dozen people had assembled at the homestead, eager to help set up a burial and memorial service for someone they’d never met. There were four men in dark overalls and black hats and two women in dark dresses with bonnets, all hardworking country folk just like Enta. Two of the men each carried a pair of shovels. They closely followed behind the other two men who carried an empty wooden casket over to a table placed on the front lawn. Then they all went to the back of the house where I figured they were going to dig a hole for Edgar’s burial plot.
The women busied themselves by setting up seats and a buffet table on Enta’s whitewashed porch. I followed them into the kitchen where they tirelessly prepared a luncheon for eight. Enta turned down my offers to help with the food preparation. She thanked me with a gentle hug and asked that I go to the barn and feed the animals instead. “We cannot forget about them in our time of sadness. They also need to eat.”
After feeding Enta’s cow and pig and the Estrel-pony, I walked over to the back of the house and watched as the men finished digging the hole for Edgar’s grave. They finished their task quickly with eight hands and four shovels. At least he didn’t die alone in his nowhere, I thought. He’d been with Enta, someone who was able to care for him and keep him comfortable in his final days. Afterward, I went back in the house and up to the guest room where I’d slept the night before so that I could clean up before the service. Enta had laid out the same homespun clothes she’d made for me back when Edgar and I traveled together to visit her. I put them on and tossed my jeans and T-shirt aside.
Everything was ready when I returned to the porch. Edgar’s body was positioned inside the casket set outside on the lawn. Enta and the others must have dressed and moved Edgar either when she sent me out to the barn or when I was upstairs getting dressed. I sighed, mentally thanking Enta for sparing me from that part of the preparations.
I sat down in one of the rocking chairs next to a sprightly townswoman with bright blue eyes, where I numbly sat through most of the service, trying to make sense of the fact that Edgar was gone. It didn’t feel real. When Enta asked me if I had anything to say, I stood up from the rocking chair, dazed.
“I showed up at his workshop one day to ask for his help,” I said. “And he helped me, a complete stranger.” I blinked back tears. “He helped me, but I couldn’t help him stay alive. It was too late. I—”
I lost my voice and sat down.
The woman sitting next to me patted my arm.
Enta spoke after me. I’m sure her eulogy was a lot more eloquent. I didn’t hear most of it, though. Certain words caught my attention— Genius. Inventive. Helpful. Kind. But, for the most part, spaced out, my mind filled with my own thoughts and broodings. What would happen to the workshop in the woods now that Edgar was gone? Where would I go after completing my research of Valcas’ past?
The workshop was abandoned, but now that I knew it was a nowhere, I wasn’t sure whether going back there was such a good idea. Enta was just as affected by Edgar’s death as I was. She had her own life and I didn’t want to burden her. But at least I had the travel glasses. Maybe my father was still out there somewhere. Maybe I was ready to find him. Ready or not, I was running out of options.
After the porch service, we gathered behind the house to watch as the four men lowered Edgar’s casket into the ground and then shoveled the dirt back into the hole they’d made. One of the women, the sprightly one, sang a hymn that I hadn’t heard before. She sang about eternal rest and the profound peace of those who slumber knowing that they are surrounded by their loved ones. Her voice ran sharp with a slight trill at the end of each phrase. I sniffled as Enta joined the song on the second verse.
Everyone returned to the porch for lunch. The sprightly woman tried to engage me in conversation when she noticed that I hadn’t eaten anything on my plate. The corners of her bright blue eyes and rosy lips crinkled when she spoke. I assured her that there was nothing wrong with the chicken salad sandwich and spoonful of homemade macaroni salad that I’d taken from the buffet table.
“Thank you for helping Enta with all of this for Edgar,” I told her. “He meant a lot to me, to both of us.”
She smiled knowingly as she pointed to her heart and her stomach. “You are feeling it the most where it hurts here and here,” she said. “But don’t let that affect what you know you must do in here,” she added while pointing to her head. “Your friend is gone now, but here you are still alive. What would your friend think of that?”
I nodded and excused myself to spend some time alone at Edgar’s freshly covered grave. The woman’s message was kind of strange. I didn’t know whether she was providing sympathy in general or if her words meant something specific to me. “Where do I go from here?” I asked Edgar’s grave. “What do I do?”