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I bit my lip, stroked Panther’s silky ears.

Was that what this was? Had some part of me been trying to return to something I knew, something that felt safe and “normal” to me? Had I come here for the same reason I went running with Black, or swimming in the ocean in the dark, the same reason I cried alone in the shower about my sister, or Solonik, or even Ian, the fiancé who tried to kill me?

It was like some part of me livedthereagain, in that earlier time.

Strangely, that felt like a comfortable place to me, even though I hadn’t been particularly happy back then. Maybe it just felt more real.

I knew Black was struggling, too.

Black’s nightmares had returned, bad enough to have him screaming out sometimes at night, or I’d find him sitting upright, covered in sweat, panting, and he’d try his damnedest to let me comfort him. He’d force himself to stay in bed, to try and talk to me, even when I could feel him desperately wanting to get up and go.

In more normal moments, over coffee or dinner or during quiet moments in the day, Black mostly dismissed these things as “normalcy pains” and “being an ordinary seer” and “just needing time” and “our light rearranging itself” and maybe hewas right about all those things, but it also felt like a way to distance himself.

Anyway, I didn’t really know what being a “normal seer” was supposed to look like, and Black likely hadn’t experienced that since he was roughly a teenager, so telling ourselves that maybe wasn’t as helpful as he hoped.

On our last conference call, Yarli agreed with Black that our ordinary “seer” emotions were stretching their legs without the interference of those other presences. She further agreed with Black that our emotions had been muted and manipulated at various times while we’d been possessed by those… beings? Archetypal forces? Gods?

Anyway, she agreed with Black. She said we just needed time.

She also offered to try and help us when she and Manny returned.

I really hoped Black would take her up on that. I definitely planned to.

I glanced round my old clinician’s office and drummed my fingers on the arms of my very squeaky andnot-ergonomic chair.

As I did, it hit me that I’d already made up my mind.

I wasn’t doing this.

I wasn’t going to knowingly try and turn the clock back on my life. Whatever brought me here, back to this place, the spell felt broken. I didn’t want to be a clinician. I didn’t want to work out of this office half-filled with my old ghosts.

I’d take Black’s offer, and not just of an office space.

I’d use that damned monstrous espresso-maker he bought––a machine I knew, somehow, Black had mostly gotten for me, even if it once belonged to Cal. I’d start inviting Nick and Angel out to lunch again, and we’d walk to the Ferry Building or Chinatown, or drive to North Beach or NOPA or the park. I’d re-join my dojo, maybe find a decent yoga studio. I’d call my oldcollege friends, throw a few dinner parties. I’d go to the beach, and to Shakespeare in the Park, visit museums and outdoor markets, see bands and plays and watch the sunset.

I’d donormalthings.

Somewhere along the line, I’d forgotten to do normal things.

Even before Black, I’d been haunted by what happened to my parents and my sister. I hadn’t been able to let go of Zoe. I’d been stuck, unable to move on.

But that mystery had been solved for a while now.

I no longer needed to spend nights awake, agonizing over what I could have done differently, what Ishouldhave done to save her.

What happened to Zoe wasn’t my fault.

It was strange, but I’d never really acknowledged that. I’d never reallyletit be over. I’d never given myself the silence and space to think itcouldbe over, what that would mean, or how it would feel.

I sat there, stroking my dog’s head, and let myself think it now.

That part of my life was over. It was really, really over.

Something about that brought a sharp pang of hope to my chest.

It also terrified me.

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