“I don’t know what to say,” I said.

“I hate it when that happens,” he replied. “Fortunately… I have some ideas to spare.” He sat up against his pillow. “Tell me, Dr. Howle—if you wouldn’t mind—what did you do with Catamander Brave? I would like to know.”

While I mulled over what to say, Andalon covered her eyes.

I feel the same way, I thought-said.

I was terrified I was gonna crash and burn.

“It did for me what kaiju did for you, I guess,” I said. “It gave an awkward kid some sorely needed delusions of grandeur.”

Mr. Himichi responded with a wry smile. “That was one sentence. I think you owe me more than that.”

I tried to look him in the eyes, but it was hard. I wasn’t prepared for how vulnerable I felt.

Nervous, I coughed. “Well,” I began, “when you spend enough time waiting to be picked up after school that you can get nearly all your homework done before you’ve gone home… life gets very lonely very quickly,” I said.

This was before my sister had gotten her driver’s license.

“Eventually, you have nothing to do but pace in circles in the courtyard, talking to the flowers or the fountain, or maybe checking to see if someone had forgotten to lock the doors to the library.” I sighed; he nodded. “There’s only so many different ways you can go up and down a set of steps,” I added, “and, I should know—I tried them all.”

“Go on,” Mr. Himichi said, with an encouraging nod. “I like where this story is going.”

My lips quivered, barely able to believe they had a reason to smile. “One day, one of the school counselors reached out to me. She sat down next to me on the grass—I remember it was grass, because I was wearing shorts at the time, and they weren’t doing the best job of keeping the grass from tickling my legs. We talked about my Dad for a while, and about why the Night was dark, and at the end… she handed me a copy of Catamander Brave. Her son worked in the publishing business; she got copies for free.”

“After that, the school courtyard was never a courtyard for me, ever again. I’d stick out my arms and tilt and skip,” I said, sticking out my arms to demonstrate, “pretending I was Cat, sailing beyond the Night, across the Sea Between the Worlds.”

Mr. Himich coughed, but smiled anyway. “Rich with hope, adventure, and more,” he said, quoting his own, immortal lines.

“And when he finally made it back home…” For a second, I looked away. “…I cried. Cat, Sina, Masks of Truth, Red Fred… they kept me up late, night after night.”

Even though I was knee-deep in a hazmat suit, my old habit of deep breathing to stay calm took hold of me.

“My life hasn’t been as lucky as I would have liked it to be,” I said, “but… at the very least, when I close my eyes and think back to your stories, and the time I spent sharing them with my children… that gives me a reason to smile.”

Breathing in and out as best as he could, Mr. Himichi stared at his hands, crossed in his lap.

Now came the really hard part. For all my reverence, I couldn’t keep my doubts silent. I had to let him know.

“Why didn’t you respond to my letters?” I said.

Mr. Himichi stared at me for a while, and then sighed. The smile he gave me broke my heart and then built it back up again.

“I’m… shy,” he said. Tears twinkled in the corners of his eyes. “Even after all these years, I’m still afraid of people. I’m sorry. Truly, I am.”

I was speechless. I didn’t know what to say. “B-But—”

“—I didn’t respond to any of the letters,” he said. “I couldn’t. To this day, it pains me that I couldn’t.”

“Just because you were shy?” I said, unable to believe it.

He nodded. “That was part of it, but it goes deeper. I…” Mr. Himichi sighed. “I didn’t know what to say.”

“I don’t understand…” I said, desperate for clarification.

“People say that my work moves them. But…” he swallowed, “my words are nothing compared to the letters my readers send me. Every letter I receive is the greatest work of art the world will ever know. They move me more deeply than any of my own creations. It makes my work seem lifeless in comparison. And, if I may be honest with you… I don’t know what I am doing. I never have, nor have I ever been convince that what I have made is of any real quality, except in the smallest pieces here and there. So… to receive praise for what I have done?” He shuddered. “That, Dr. Howle… that’s a kindness that goes beyond all others. If I tried to reply to the letters, I’d spend my whole life fussing over how to express my gratitude in a way that did it justice, and I would not have made anything else at all. I am rather indecisive, after all. The best I could manage was to infuse my works with my gratitude.”

I nodded, tears in my eyes. I recited the dedicatory that began each and every one of Mr. Himichi’s works. “To you, my reader, I give my deepest, most woefully inadequate thanks. Please enjoy what I have to offer. It means more to me than you could ever know.”

He smiled.

“That was the best I could do. I’m sorry,” he said, bowing his head. “Please… forgive me.”

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

I grabbed hold of his hand. “Thank you,” I said. “Thank you.”

Pulling away from me, he brought his hand to his mouth and wept.

I quietly waited for him to calm back down.

“I do think, though, it would have been better if I was less of a recluse.” He managed a quiver of a smile. “You make me think it might not have been as bad as I thought it would be. And… it’s what Lily would have wanted.” He nodded at me.

“You don’t know how much that means to me,” I said. “I forgive you. I forgive you.” I nodded, crying. “How could I not?” I added. “You were the maker of my dreams. And you’re not the only one who struggles with indecision.”

“And you don’t know how much that means to me,” he said, his voice cracking. “Now, here, at the end, I just wish all the others could forgive me, too.”

“They would in a heartbeat, if they knew what you’d just told me,” I said.

He bowed his head again. “I am glad my stories made for such good company, Dr. Howle.”

“It has always been something of a struggle, you know.”

“What?” I asked.

He nodded again. “As much as I love telling stories… I loathe having to make them. It is good to know that my struggles were not in vain.”

“You…?” I gasped like a gossip columnist. “Loathe…?”

“Oh yes,” Mr. Himichi smiled, wiping a tear from his cheek with his trembling hand. As he moved, the light shone through the thin fabric of his hospital gown, especially around his arms. Through the light, I could see the infection lurking in him—splotches of shadows beneath his drooping sleeves.

“I’m terribly distrustful of myself,” he said. “I have to squeeze and squeeze to figure out what I want. Some people can build a world from just a face or a pebble. Their thoughts flow down from the mountaintops of their mind, and they join together in rivers and seas. For creators such as them, story-telling is story-making. I wish I could do that, but I can’t.”

I couldn’t tell if he was looking at me or looking through me. It was like a spigot had come loose somewhere inside him.

“I’m indecisive as heck,” I said. “I hate it. I hate it so much.”

He raised an eyebrow. “What flavor of indecision do you have?” he asked.

“I’m worried I’m not going to be good enough. I’m worried that I won’t make the right decision.”

“How do you know whether you’ve made the right decision?” he asked.

I pondered that for a while.

“I guess that’s the whole problem,” I said, “I don’t.”

He nodded. “Never stop trying to find out, Dr. Howle,” he said, “it makes all the difference.”

“What about you?” I asked. “How do you know?”

“Well,” he said, “as a matter of principle, I believe it is a terrible thing to care more about a set of rules than about doing good however you can. But, in that, I suppose I’m just as much of a hypocrite as the next person. More than being good, I care that my work is faithful to my ideas. Whether it’s the characters, the twist, the world, or the moments themselves… I want to do my ideas justice. I exist for their sake, not the other way around.”

For a moment, he raised a trembling finger, as if to accuse.

“If I was willing to let my ideas become something other than their truth, my miseries would be a millionth of what they are. But what kind of father would that make me to them?” He shook his head. “We can’t rewrite our children, least of all by a wave of the hand. You have to build them up in a billion million pieces, step by step, until the day when they are ready to leave the nest and live a life of their own, even if they never do. And you want them to be good, even if they aren’t.”

“But… why?” I asked, thinking of my own children.

Thinking of all the people I’d tried and failed to save. “Why go through all that pain and anguish?”

Mr. Himichi tilted his head to the side. “I suffer for them because the only thing that hurts more is the thought of a life where I hadn’t. When every step forward is a battle, it’s hard not to fall in love with what you’re fighting for. And when others look upon what I have made, I will live again, and, with luck, in a way, maybe Lily will, as well.”

He coughed and wretched. The noise broke the spell his words had cast over me.

“Why are you telling me this?” I asked.

“I told it to you to give it to you,” he said. “I think I can trust that you’ll keep it safe. I…”

Mr. Himichi looked up at the fluorescent lights in the ceiling-grid. He watched them like an eclipse of the moon.

“…I need the extra room,” he said, ominously.

I gulped.

“And… I don’t know,” he added, “maybe… I hoped that you might understand, as a professional in fixing those who are broken.”

Here, I cried. I didn’t bother hiding it. It wasn’t just Kosuke Himichi anymore; it was my wife, my children, my friends; those who were soon to leave me, and those who had long since departed.

I think… in that moment, sitting there, talking with my hero, I finally understood what it really meant for a world to end. It’s not just you that goes; it was everybody, and everything. Even the truths that seem to live forever die when the world ends. The fires go out, for there is no one left to carry them

“For once, I guess,” I said, with hesitation, “we’re both in luck.” I nodded. “I know what you mean, about marching onward, even when almost everything is telling you to stop.” I lowered my head, briefly glancing at Andalon on the floor beside me. “As a kid, my father wasn’t there for my sister and I as much as I would have liked. And,” my voice broke, “now, he’s gone. But he… left me so many precious things.” I chuckled through my tears. “He left me enough money to pay off my student debt. And… he left me music. The sound, the heart, and the soul. The clarinet started as his favorite instrument, and that made it mine, as well. It still is, to this day.”

I took a deep breath.

“Years ago,” I said, dredging up the calamity, “I lost a son, Rale. Everyone I know thinks it’s my fault—myself, most of all. He might be gone, but… I’m trying to make sure that, like your Lily, he lives on. And not just him. For years, now, I’ve been slowly writing a Sonata for Clarinet and Piano, slaving over it, down to the very last rest. It’s a sepulcher for those I’ve loved. It’s not quite finished yet, but one day, I hope, it will be. I want to see it soar, the way your creations have.”

“And I would like to hear it, Genneth,” Mr. Himichi said.

“Someday,” I nodded, wiping the tears from my eyes.

Behind me, a fist rapped against the glass. I turned to see a knight-like figure armored in PPE, with an oversized, plastic container in his arms. It looked like you’d need a power tool to cut through those thick, bulky gloves of his.

“Art supplies,” he said, the words muffled by his helmet-visor and the rebreather unit.

I got up and opened the door. He thrust the container into my arms, and trod off back to the battlefield.

Tears streamed down Mr. Himichi’s liver-spotted cheeks as I brought him the treasure trove.

“On the bed,” he said, eyes glistening in the light. “On the bed.” He patted his hand on the blanket.

I placed the container between his legs and popped open the lid. Mr. Himichi pulled out tools by the handful: paper, erasers, pencils, pens, crayons, rulers, markers, and on and on. I could only imagine the heady aroma the stuff might have had: the earthy graphite; the marker ink, pungent and fruit-scented; the fine musk of fresh, white rubber; the paper sheets, slicing through the air.

Taking the lid from my hands, he reached for the swinging arm table at the bedside. I grabbed it for him, swinging it into position right in front of him.

“There you go,” I said.

Mr. Himichi grabbed a sheet and held it in his trembling hand.

He turned to me. “Thank you,” he said. “Thank you for letting me share, and for sharing with me in return. But now, please… leave me.” He turned his gaze to the blank sheets. “I must work, while I still can.”

What vistas did he dream of there, I wonder? And would I get to see those boundless horizons for myself?

I looked at him, and he looked at me, our pasts and presents meeting eye-to-eye. And then, he went to work, and I drew the curtains over the scene, and left like the wind.