Chapter Text
Father had given them separate rooms.
It had seemed like great fun at first, as the whole house did. Grandmother’s house had been no small thing, but their Father’s was made of endless rooms for the two of them to poke their heads into. Dark bedrooms, mostly, but a huge kitchen with so much dust on the counters that Jacob had sneezed, and a table stretching the length of its room to dine at with enough empty chairs to race Evie for how many they could sit at, and the grounds! There was so much to see!
Father had guided them to Evie’s room first, and Jacob had looked around, frowning. "And my bed?" he’d asked. Evie’s room had been bare from floor to ceiling, her bed neatly made and the only thing of note beyond an empty bookshelf. Their things would come from Grandmother’s soon, Father had promised. Jacob still didn’t understand why he hadn’t let them pack some toys with their clothes, and Father’s explanation of making the best use of space and not wasting necessities for sentimental things had not helped.
"Your room is down the hall from your sister," Father had told him. Evie and Jacob had exchanged uneasy glances, but when Jacob had started to ask ‘why’, he’d had to look up at their father. And up, and up, and up, to the stern-set mouth and distant eyes that were the only expression Jacob had ever seen on his face in the short time they’d known him. He’d swallowed the question and nodded.
Now, Jacob curled up into an even tighter ball in his bed. The wind was starting to howl outside his window. It didn’t howl at Grandmother’s. It crooned; it whistled; it even hissed; but it never blew with so much force that Jacob wanted to pull his blankets over his head and hide.
Evie was supposed to be here.
Evie was supposed to talk with him until he fell asleep. She’d tell him he was acting like a baby about the wind, and she’d agree with him that the blankets were too scratchy, and she’d be where Jacob could always find her. Instead, Evie was a world away, down a strange, dark hall in a strange, dark house.
Jacob sniffed. He tucked his chin down against his chest.
He didn’t want to sleep here. This wasn’t his room.
His room was at Grandmother’s. It was full of the toys he’d divided up evenly with his sister and then stolen from her only because she stole his first, and Evie’s journals that Jacob wasn’t allowed to read and did anyway despite the fact that she never wrote anything interesting, and Jacob’s bed tucked right next to his sister’s so he could reach out halfway for her and find her hand when she reached back. This bed was awful. It was stiff. It smelled funny. He hated it.
He hated this house. He hated every empty room of it for tricking him into thinking he could like it here.
He hated-
Jacob sniffled. A lump grew in his throat as he tried to be brave. The tears came anyway as the wind cracked like a whip on his window, and he flinched down under the blankets.
He hated Father! He hated him! Why did he ever come back from India? Jacob didn’t need him, and neither did Evie! He should leave! It wasn’t hard for him to leave the first time, so he should- He should-
Jacob wiped hot tears off of his cheeks and wanted his sister with him so much that he thought he would die.
That would serve Father right. Jacob would die right here, and it would be all his fault, and he’d be sorry. He would be sad if Jacob died. Wouldn’t he?
Evie would be. Jacob resolved not to die after all, for her sake. It didn’t make the wanting any easier or the tears stop.
Jacob heard a click. He sat up in alarm. He tried to choke his sobs silent, but he sounded hiccupy, too loud to fool anyone. Another click, and a creaking hinge, and Jacob couldn’t breathe. Someone was in his room-
"Jacob?" Evie said, very softly.
"I’m awake," Jacob answered. She was going to hear that he was upset and make fun of him; he just knew it.
Evie took a shivery little breath. "Oh," she whispered. "Is your bed too cold?" Jacob shook his head before remembering she couldn’t see him.
"No. Is yours?" Evie’s heels tapped the floor like she was rocking on the balls of her feet.
"The blankets are thin," she said, "and I don’t have a rug, so the floor was even colder." Jacob heard her step closer. He squinted into the dark as hard as he could. The wind quieted until all that remained was a whisper. Like a cloak lifted from over his eyes, Jacob found he could see the room in dim, gray outlines. He could only hear Evie’s breaths—quick in, quick out, like she’d been running from something—and when he blinked at his sister, she glowed.
Jacob stared at her. He stumbled into speaking again.
"Mine are heavy. There’s space for both of us." The vision of his sister, who was so bright in the twilight blur of the room that it hurt Jacob’s eyes a little, shuffled forward and jutted her chin out.
"Father said to stay in our own rooms." Her voice was still unsure and quivery.
"You’ve already broken that rule, then," Jacob pointed out, and Evie smiled. She thought he couldn’t see it, he realized. He smiled back and wondered if he would be just as bright as she was. "Come on, get in." He added, a moment later, in Grandmother’s Welsh, "Come to bed, dear Evie, please?"
"We’ll get in trouble," she responded in kind.
"Together," Jacob agreed, and that was all Evie needed to hear. She clambered into the bed with him. Jacob wasted no time in tucking himself against her body as Evie drew the covers over them. The scratchy texture bothered him less with her there. Even if the bed had been cold, they would have kept each other warm. Evie’s hair tickled his nose, and Jacob wrinkled it and squirmed. The sound of the wind began to pick up again, but a gale against the window could barely made Jacob wince. When he opened his eyes again, there was only darkness, her presence told in the sound of her slowing exhales and the way she hugged him tightly. Maybe the way she had shone was temporary madness, but he hoped it returned to him.
"Do you wish Father hadn’t come back?" Jacob whispered into his sister’s shoulder, and for secret solidarity, he stuck to their grandmother’s tongue. He felt safer in her language than in Father’s. Evie was quiet for so long that he almost thought she’d fallen asleep without hearing him.
"I don’t know," she said. "I think I missed him." Jacob frowned.
"How could you miss him? He’s…" Jacob wasn’t supposed to say it, but it was true and he didn’t care. "He’s a stranger."
"…Can you miss someone backwards?" Jacob didn’t understand what she meant, let alone have an answer. "I miss him now for every day he wasn’t there."
"That’s stupid," Jacob said as his heart ached in agreement.
"You’re stupid," Evie mumbled with a little hurt. Jacob searched for her hand and tangled his fingers with hers. They fit together perfectly and always would.
"You’ll never have to miss me." He would be better than Father, Jacob promised.
Evie squeezed his hand back. His eyes grew heavier and heavier. He could feel Evie’s heartbeat against his palm, or maybe that was his own, as it slowed. He wanted to fall asleep only after she did—to make sure she didn’t go anywhere—but his body had other plans as he drifted off into somewhere warm that felt like home.