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Bob and Martha Gray lived in an old neighborhood along a row of lovingly maintained brownstones. Bob was the brother of Seth’s father, and after Seth’s parents passed, Bob and his wife, Martha, had taken in Seth and made a home for him. They’d never had kids of their own, but they had room in their house and hearts, and Seth was given a place to grieve and grow. Martha was a retired nurse, and Bob still worked as a super for an apartment building uptown, his life as a meter butler years behind him. Nick knew their home almost as well as he knew his own, though he hadn’t been over in a long while.

Their street was lined with trees, the leaves turning from green to gold. The air was cool, and horns honked as soon as the lights changed. A cop car rolled by, but Nick ignored it. His dad still hadn’t texted him.

He’d have to deal with that later.

Nick went up the steps to the Gray house and rang the doorbell. Martha had told him long ago that he could come in whenever he pleased, but he needed to make a good impression today.

They’d come to his mom’s funeral. Bob had worn an ill-fitting suit—too small for his ever-expanding middle—and Martha had hugged him so hard, he felt his bones creak. She didn’t tell him she was sorry, or that everything would get better. Nick would have screamed if she had—he’d heard it so many times already. Instead, as Seth stood at his side and held his hand, she’d whispered to him that if he ever needed an escape, to come to their house, and she would help him do whatever was needed.

He’d never forgotten that, even through the hazy fog that descended for months when Before had become After.

He heard the familiar chimes ring in the house and stepped back to wait. Bob was probably still at work, Seth up in his room, comforter pulled over his head and crinkled tissues on the floor by his bed.

He could see the outline of someone approaching through the glass on the door. He forced a smile on his face as the door opened.

Martha’s eyes widened in shock when she saw him. It was brief, and he couldn’t be sure it even happened, since she smiled brightly. “Nick! Well, isn’tthisa surprise. Whatever are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be in class?”

“Hi, Mrs. Gray. I just came to see Seth, since he was sick. And it’s three thirty. School got out almost an hour ago.”

Her smile widened. “Ofcourseit’s three thirty and school is out already. Why, I must have lost track of time. Come in! Comein,dear child, and let me look at you. It’s been far too long since I’ve seen your face.”

He didn’t even get a chance to respond before she’d grabbed him by the arm and pulled him into the house, shutting the door behind him. “Yes,” she said, and she was speaking so loudly, it was almost like she was shouting. “It has beenforeversinceNicholas Bell has been in this house.Andrightat this very moment!”

Nick tilted his head at her. “Are you all right?”

“Fine, dear, just fine,” she said loudly as she dragged him toward the kitchen. “Come! Come, even though it’s beenmonthssince you’ve been here,Nick,you still have an affinity for my peanut butter cookies, don’t you? I just made a fresh batch yesterday, and we should make sure you have at least six or seven before youhead upstairsto see Seth, the poor boy.”

“Uh, sure?” Nick said. “Also, you’re a lot stronger than I expected you to be for someone your age. No offense.”

“None taken,” she said, looking back at him and smiling again. The wrinkles around her eyes deepened. “I used to have to lift patients at least three times your size. Built up some muscles. Speaking of, you’re still as skinny as all get out. Maybe ten cookies before you go up and seeSeth.”

Nick winced as she bellowed that last word.

The kitchen was as homey as he remembered it, small and tidy.Martha and Bob had lived in the same brownstone since they’d married more than thirty years earlier. When Nick had asked why they didn’t have any kids before Seth, Martha told him he shouldn’t ask others that as it might be painful for some people, but in her case, life always seemed to get in the way. But then she’d said that maybe someone somewhere knew that Seth would need a home one day, and it was a good enough reason for her.

She shoved Nick down at the large table where he’d sat many times before, the vase of autumn flowers in the middle rattling but not tipping over. “There,” she said. “Comfy? Good. Now, I know that one cannot have ten peanut butter cookies without having a glass of—”

A crash came from somewhere below.

Nick looked down at the floor. “Is there someone in the basement?”

Martha laughed a little wildly. “Of course not! Seth is ill upstairs, and Bob is at the apartment building fixing a sprung pipe.”

“Uh, then what was that noise?”

“I didn’t hear any—”

Another crash. This time the floor shook.

“Oh,” Martha said. She turned toward the cookie jar shaped like a duck that she’d found in a flea market in 1978, or so she’d told Nick. Rather proudly too. “That.That is… the washing machine. Absolutely dreadful thing. It needs a new… filtering… valve. Yes, a newfiltering valve.Bob is going to get right on that as soon as he gets home. In fact, after he’s done with the leaking pipe at the apartment, he was going to go pick up—”

Footsteps ran up the basement stairs.

Then the basement door opened.

Then it slammed closed.