Finn

At one thirty-two in the morning, my phone lights up on the nightstand.

Mack: Are you awake?

I stare at the message.

Me: No.

Three dots appear immediately.

Mack: That’s unfortunate.

Me: I’ll let you know when I am.

Mack: Excellent. I’ll be outside.

I sit up.

The rain has softened since nightfall. It moves against the windows in a low, steady hush, quieter than the ocean but more persistent. The room is dark except for the pale rectangle of my phone and the faint amber glow slipping beneath my door from the hall.

On the floor near my desk sits the cardboard box Mack brought from Seattle.

One of my shirts hangs over the side. Beneath it are two books Calla abandoned at Mack’s apartment, three chargers that may or may not belong to me, and the black leather journal Mack gave me for Christmas.

My phone vibrates again.

Mack: Finn. It is cold.

Me: You live in Seattle.

Mack: And yet I remain mortal.

I push back the covers.

The floorboard near the door creaks when I stand.

For one irrational moment, I freeze.

Nothing follows.

No voice from the dark asking me to save it. No crow outside the window speaking my name in a voice it should not possess.

Only the ever-present rain.

I pull a sweatshirt over my T-shirt, step into a pair of shoes, and open my bedroom door.

Calla’s door is closed across the hall. The narrow line of darkness beneath it tells me Mack has turned off the lamp.

I move down the hallway without turning on another light. The walls settle around me with the quiet complaints of an old house. Somewhere downstairs, the clock in the sitting room marks the half hour with a single muted chime.

Mom and Dad’s door remains closed.

At the bottom of the stairs, I stop.

The kitchen is empty.

I pass through it and unlock the garden door.

Mack stands beneath the narrow overhang with her arms folded tightly across her chest. She is wearing black leggings, boots, and an oversized gray sweater that slips off one shoulder. Her blonde hair is twisted into a loose knot that has already begun collapsing. Several strands cling to her cheek in the mist.

“You took six minutes,” she whispers.

“You survived.”

“Barely.”

Mack looks at me.

“Come on,” I say.

Mack glances past me into the kitchen. “Where?”

“Somewhere Calla won’t walk in and demand a complete accounting of our body language.”

I close the door carefully behind me.

Mack follows me across the terrace and down the rain-dark path. Gravel shifts softly beneath our shoes. The greenhouse glows beyond the garden, warm light filtering through the wet glass.

I look away from it.

The western pane is hidden from this angle.

That should make no difference.

It does.

I keep walking.

The chapel stands beyond the yew hedge, where the garden gives way to older trees. It is small compared to the house, built from dark gray stone with ivy climbing one wall and narrow windows set beneath pointed arches. Rain has turned the slate roof almost black.

Mack stops at the edge of the path.

“You have a chapel.”

“You saw it when you arrived.”

“I thought it was a decorative outbuilding.”

“I’m not sure that’s a thing.”

I take the old brass key from beneath the lip of the stone planter beside the door.

Mack watches me.

“You hide the key outside?”

“God knows where it is.”

Her mouth opens.

I unlock the door before she can decide whether to laugh or disown me.

The chapel smells like cold stone, rain, holiness, and the faint residue of candle wax. Moonlight filters through the narrow stained-glass windows, laying fractured patches of blue and violet across the floor. The altar is little more than a stone table beneath the eastern window. Two columns of dark wooden pews leave a narrow aisle between them.

Two candles burn before the altar.

Mack looks toward them.

“What are they for?”

“One for Calla. One for me.”

Her gaze moves to my face. “Your mom lights candles for you?”

“Twice a day. She lights the new ones from the old flames before they burn out.”

“Always?”

“As far as I know.”

The flames move faintly in the draft, throwing light across the blue glass behind them.

“Why?” Mack asks.

I slide the chapel key into my pocket.

“She thinks everyone should have a light waiting for them somewhere.”

Mack looks at the candles again.

“That’s beautiful.”

“Yes.”

I do not mention mom’s OCD fear that if these flames go out, we will die.

Mack walks farther into the chapel. Her gaze moves over the carved ends of the pews, the brass candle stands, and the arched stonework surrounding the windows.

“This is not a normal amount of atmosphere for one family.”

“We take ambiance seriously.”

For a moment, neither of us moves.

Then she crosses the space between us and catches the front of my sweatshirt in both hands.

I kiss her before she can say anything.

Her back meets the door softly. Her mouth is cold from the night, but her hands are warm where they slide beneath my sweatshirt and settle against my waist. She rises onto her toes, and I bend toward her, one hand braced against the wood beside her head.

Three hours ago, I lifted her off the floor in front of my entire family and pretended it meant nothing.

This does not feel like nothing.

It has never felt like nothing.

Mack’s fingers curl into my shirt.

“You missed me,” she whispers against my mouth.

“You missed Cheeto.”

“He’s a terrible kisser.”

“So are you.”

She bites my lower lip.

I reconsider my position.

I kiss her again, slower this time. The chapel disappears around us. The strange week disappears with it…the man from the sea, the paper boat, the writing on the greenhouse glass, the voice on the sidewalk.

There is only Mack.

Her familiar hands.

The faint coconut scent in her hair.

The small sound she makes when my mouth moves to the place in the hollow of her collarbone that she pretends isn’t sensitive.

I know her.

In a week filled with things I cannot explain, that knowledge feels dangerously close to relief. This, I know. This, I’m sure about.

Mack pulls back first.

Her eyes move over my face.

“What?”

She touches beneath one of my eyes with her thumb.

“How much have you slept?”

“Enough.”

“How much?”

“I haven’t been keeping minutes.”

“Finn.”

“Mackenzie.”

“Don’t use my government name to distract me.”

“I use it because it inspires fear.”

I catch her wrist and kiss the inside of it.

Her expression softens despite her best efforts.

“Calla says you disappeared into the greenhouse last night.”

I release her hand.

“Calla says many things.”

“She’s worried.”

“She regards worry as a competitive sport.”

“So do I.”

“That seems exhausting.”

“It is. Take off your sweatshirt.”

I glance down at myself. “That was an abrupt change in strategy.”

“I want to make sure you haven’t been concealing additional mysterious injuries.”

“That sounds suspiciously like something Calla would say.”

“Calla would have a camera.”

My laugh escapes before I can stop it.

Mack smiles.

“There you are.”

The words land somewhere I do not want them.

I look past her toward the darkened altar.

“Come sit down.”

We choose the last pew, farthest from the windows. Mack curls into my side, drawing her legs onto the seat. I put one arm around her shoulders, and she rests her head against my chest.

For a while, neither of us speaks.

Rain streams down the stained glass. Wind moves through the trees outside, dragging branches lightly across the stone. The sound resembles fingernails if I allow it to.

I decide against it.

Mack traces a slow line over the seam of my jeans.

“This is sacrilegious,” she says.

“We’re sitting.”

“We’re doing more than sitting.”

“I won’t tell.”

“You think God won’t notice?”

“If He has been monitoring my romantic life, He abandoned us both some time ago.”

“Romantic?”

I look down.

Mack’s face is partially hidden against my chest, but I can see the corner of her smile.

“That isn’t what I said.”

“It absolutely is.”

“I said romantic life as a general category.”

“And I’m in the category.”

“You’re becoming less attractive by the second.”

“Liar.”

I catch her chin and kiss her once, mostly to end the conversation.

It works for nearly a minute.

When we separate, she settles against me again with a satisfied breath.

“We have to tell her,” Mack says.

I know immediately who she means.

“Not tonight.”

“Obviously not tonight. Tonight she would kill us both and make your father embalm the evidence.”

“Dad has professional standards.”

“Soon, Finn.”

The humor has left her voice.

I look toward the two candles burning before the altar. Calla's flame bends in the draft, then steadies.

“Soon,” I say.

Mack studies my face as though deciding whether the word constitutes a promise.

Then she settles against me again.

Mack’s gaze travels across the chapel. Over the carved ends of the pews. The brass candle stands. The stone arches framing the windows.

“Can I ask you something rude?” Mack says.

“You have never required permission before.”

“This is a little rude even for me.”

“That raises expectations considerably.”

She sits up and turns to face me.

“I always assumed that because your dad is a mortician, your family was solidly middle class.”

I wait.

She winces.

“I warned you.”

“You did.”

“I don’t mean poor. Obviously. Morticians probably do fine.”

“We survive.”

“But this house…” She gestures around us. “Finn, this is an estate. You have a Carriage House and a greenhouse and a private chapel with stained glass. There are rooms upstairs that no one appears to use.”

“One contains Christmas decorations.”

“That does not help.”

“There are many Christmas decorations.”

“Where did all this come from?”

“The ground, primarily. Stone. Wood. Some metal.”

She shoves my shoulder.

I smile. Mack waits.

“Mom’s family had money.”

“They don’t have it anymore?”

“No, the money exists, they don’t.”

“Finn.”

“Her maiden name is Savage. Her family founded Savage Industries.”

Mack goes very still.

Mack turns so one knee presses against my thigh.

“What does Savage Industries do?”

“It owns things.”

“What things?”

“Other things.”

“You don’t know.”

“I have successfully avoided knowing for twenty-three years.”

“Does your mother run it?”

“No. It's in the UK. There’s a CEO and a board and a large population of people who use phrases like quarterly outlook. Mom has a seat on the board, but she isn’t involved in the daily operation.”

Mack blinks.

“How have you never told me this?”

“It doesn’t come up.”

“We’ve known each other for four years.”

“I don’t think there was ever a time when the subject of our parents’ employment came up. I don’t know what your parents do.”

“Because they aren’t interesting. Does Calla understand how rich you are?”

“We aren’t rich.”

Mack slowly looks around the chapel, then back at me. I sigh.

“Mom has family money. It’s somewhere, in a bank. We don’t live extravagantly here. Calla and I share a car.”

Mack pointedly eyes our surroundings.

“We are sitting inside your wealth.”

“I’m sitting on a pew.”

“In your private chapel.” Mack’s eyebrows rise.

“Yes,” I say. “I hear it now.”

She leans back against the pew.

For a few seconds, she says nothing. The humor fades from her face, replaced by quiet curiosity.

“Was your mom raised in England? I remember Calla telling me she was born there.”

“She was. And she was raised there until she was eight.”

“What happened when she was eight?”

The answer is familiar enough to require no thought.

“Her family died in an accident.”

“All of them?”

“Her parents and her brother. He was her twin.”

Mack’s expression changes.

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“What kind of accident?”

“I don’t know.”

She looks at me. “You don’t know?”

“Mom doesn’t talk about it. She was eight, Mack. Whatever happened was bad enough that no one pushed her to provide entertaining details later. It left scars that never entirely loosened their grip.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“I know.”

I take her hand. Her fingers close around mine.

“What happened to her afterward?” she asks.

“My grandparents took her in. Dad’s parents.”

“Here?”

I nod.

“How did an eight-year-old girl from England end up with a family in Oregon?”

“Our families knew each other.”

It is what I have always been told.

I realize, as I say it, that I do not know what that means.

Business associates. Family friends. Distant relations. People who once shared a table at a wedding or crossed paths on a holiday.

I have never asked because it has never been something that mom wanted to discuss.

That feels strange now.

“So your parents grew up together,” Mack says.

“From then on.”

“And eventually fell in love.”

“I assume there were several intermediate stages.”

“That is disgustingly romantic.”

“Dad will give you a detailed explanation of guardianship law if you mention it.”

“I might.”

“He will draw diagrams.”

“I like your dad.”

“He likes diagrams.”

Mack rests her head against my shoulder again.

“So your mom built all this?”

“No. Dad’s family built the house and Carriage House in the late 1800’s. Mom restored them. Added the greenhouse, built the chapel.”

“Why did she build a chapel?”

I follow Mack’s gaze toward the eastern window.

In daylight, its glass forms an abstract arrangement of trees beneath a deep blue sky. At night, the shapes

blur into something darker. A forest with no path through it.

“She grew up on an estate called Whitley,” I say. “There was a chapel there. And she thought a funeral home should probably have one.”

I look toward the dark stone altar.

The chapel has existed for all of my life. I know which pew creaks, which window catches the last daylight, where the roof leaks during storms. I have hidden here, slept here, read here, and once spent an entire afternoon helping Calla search for a bat that had flown into the rafters.

It has always belonged to us.

Mack’s thumb moves across the back of my hand.

“She rebuilt pieces of home.”

“I suppose.”

“Here.”

“Yes.”

“And then she filled them with all of you.”

The chapel goes very quiet.

I look down at our joined hands.

“You’ve become alarmingly sentimental since crossing state lines.”

“I’ve been awake for almost twenty hours.”

“That explains it.”

“You could say something nice.”

“I brought you somewhere dry.”

“You brought me to a private chapel so your sister wouldn’t catch us making out.”

“Exactly. Chivalry.”

Mack smiles and leans into me again.

Outside, the rain moves softly over the roof.

For the first time, I wonder how much of this house began somewhere else.

We continue talking.

About Seattle. The coffeehouse. The basil plant Calla abandoned on the kitchen windowsill and Mack has

kept alive entirely through resentment.

Her voice grows quieter.

The pauses between our words lengthen.

At some point, she pulls my sweatshirt over herself because she is cold. I put on her sweater because leaving

it on the floor appears inefficient. She curls more tightly against me, one hand slipping beneath the hem.

I should wake her.

I don’t.

I lower my cheek against her hair.

The candles continue burning, their tiny flames flickering in shadows on the walls.

Calla and Finn, walking to cove with flashlights .png

I wake to the soft click of the chapel door.

For several seconds, I cannot identify where I am.

Morning light filters through the stained glass. My head is resting against the carved side of the rear pew at an angle the human spine was not designed to accommodate.

Mack is asleep against me.

At some point during the night, we abandoned sitting properly. I am wedged into the corner with one leg stretched into the aisle and the other trapped beneath the bench ahead of us. Mack is curled into my side, her cheek against my chest and one hand tucked beneath my sweater.

My left arm is beneath her.

It may already be dead.

The door is closed.

A shadow passes the narrow window beside it.

I shift carefully, trying not to wake Mack, and look toward the altar.

The two candles are taller than they were last night.

Fresh wax. New wicks. Both flames burn steadily beneath the blue glass.

Someone has replaced them.

“Shit.”

Mack stirs.

“That,” she murmurs without opening her eyes, “is not generally what a woman hopes to hear upon waking in

your arms.”

I lean far enough into the aisle to see through the nearest window.

Mom is walking down the chapel path toward the greenhouse. A shallow basket hangs from one arm. She wears green rubber boots beneath her nightgown and one of Dad’s cardigans pulled around her shoulders.

She does not look back.

Mack opens one eye.

“What time is it?”

I find my phone on the floor beneath the pew.

6:04.

“It’s six.”

“In the morning?”

Her other eye opens.

Then she sits up so quickly that sensation returns to my arm in one violent wave.

“Calla.”

“Probably asleep.”

“Your parents.”

I look toward the fresh candles.

“Mom was just here.”

Mack freezes.

“Here?”

“She lights the candles twice a day.”

“Was she inside the chapel?”

“The candles did not replace themselves.”

Mack looks down at our legs tangled together, then at her hand still beneath my sweater.

“Did she see us?”

“I think the more useful question is whether there is any conceivable way she didn’t.”

“Oh, God.”

“He was also here.”

“This isn’t the time.”

She sits upright and begins searching for her boots.

One is beneath the pew. The other rests in the aisle several feet away, although I do not remember either of

us removing them.

She crawls beneath the pew for the nearest boot. Her hair has escaped completely from its knot. Blonde waves fall around her face and down one shoulder.

I look toward the altar again.

Mom replaced both candles without waking us.

She could have spoken. Coughed. Dropped the box of matches. Made any sound that would have warned us

we had been discovered.

Instead, she left us sleeping.

Mack pulls on both boots but doesn’t lace them.

“Can we get back inside without anyone seeing us?”

“Possibly.”

“That did not inspire confidence.”

“The garden entrance opens into the kitchen. We go upstairs. You return to Calla’s room. I return to mine. No one ever knows.”

“Except your mother.”

“Yes.”

“What will she do?”

“I don’t know.”

“Is she going to tell Calla?”

“No.”

The answer comes without hesitation.

Mack studies me.

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.”

We cross the garden quickly. The greenhouse glows beyond the hedge, but Mom is hidden somewhere among the rows of plants.

The kitchen is empty. A covered bowl of dough sits near the stove, and Dad’s coffee machine has begun its automated warming cycle.

Mack slips off her boots.

We climb the stairs without speaking.

Calla’s bedroom door remains closed.

Mack reaches for the handle, then looks back at me.

“Do I look like I spent the night in a chapel?”

“You look like you lost a fight with a weather system.”

“Can you fix my hair?”

“No.”

“You didn’t even consider it.”

“I have seen what you do to your hair. It requires advanced engineering.”

She removes the pins and lets it fall around her shoulders.

“Better?”

“Marginally.”

“Liar.”

She opens Calla’s door just wide enough to slip through.

Before it closes, her hand catches the edge.

“Finn.”

“What?”

Her face appears in the narrow opening.

“I’m glad I came.”

Something in my chest tightens.

I put one hand against the door above hers.

“So am I.”

Her expression softens.

Then Calla’s sleepy voice comes from inside.

“Mack?”

The door closes in my face.

I stand there for one second.

Then I return to my room before the investigation begins.

By the time I come downstairs again, breakfast is nearly over.

This is intentional.

I enter the kitchen wearing clean clothes and an expression of innocence refined through years of practice.

Dad sits at the end of the table with the newspaper folded beside his plate. Dare is across from him. Calla sits beside Mack, who has repaired her hair and appears offensively rested.

Mom stands at the counter transferring chopped herbs into a small ceramic bowl.

No one looks at me.

“There he is,” Calla says.

“I’ve been here the entire time.”

“Not in the kitchen.”

Dad pours coffee into an empty mug and slides it toward the remaining chair.

“Sit.”

I sit.

Mom brings the bowl of herbs to the table.

Her gaze meets mine for precisely half a second.

“Good morning.”

“Morning.”

She turns to Mack. “Did you sleep well?”

Mack chokes on her coffee.

Calla pats her between the shoulder blades.

“You okay?”

“Perfect,” Mack says when she can breathe again. “I slept very well.”

“I’m glad.”

Mom serves herself more eggs.

The woman is a menace.

Dad lowers his newspaper. “Eat before it gets cold.”

I take a piece of toast.

Mack watches him.

“I have a question.”

“Lay it on me,” Dad says.

“How often do dead bodies sit up?”

Calla closes her eyes.

Dad considers the question.

“They don’t.”

“But people say they do.”

“People say many things when given access to the internet.”

“What about muscle contractions?”

“They can occur after death. But not in a manner that results in a body sitting upright.”

Dad takes a drink of coffee.

Mack leans forward.

“Has one ever moved while you were embalming it?”

“Yes.”

Her eyes widen.

“The movement was caused by residual muscle activity.”

“Did it scare you?”

“No.”

“I want to see the preparation room.”

“No,” Calla says.

Mack turns toward her. “Why not?”

“Because it’s a preparation room.”

“There’s nothing happening down there today,” Dad says. “I can show you the facility after breakfast.”

Mack brightens.

Calla points her fork at him. “You’re encouraging her.”

“She asked a reasonable question.”

“She asked whether corpses sit up.”

“It’s a common question.”

“Do fingernails keep growing?” Mack asks.

“No.”

“Hair?”

“No.”

“Has anyone ever woken up?”

“No.”

“Have you ever recognized someone?”

The room changes slightly.

Dad folds the paper more neatly.

“Yes.”

Mack’s curiosity softens. “Was that hard?”

“Yes.”

She nods.

For once, she does not ask the next question.

Dad studies her for a moment, then says, “You can see the casket elevator while you’re there.”

Mack’s eyes light up.

“At last.”

“You are so weird,” Calla says.

“And I have already lost valuable time.”

Mom laughs quietly.

“I have a historical society tour next Saturday,” she says. “Mack can have the unofficial version today.”

“You give tours?” Mack asks.

“About once a month during the summer. The funeral home isn’t included, but portions of the house, chapel,

gardens, and Carriage House are historically significant.”

“What makes the Carriage House significant?”

“The original foundation predates most of the main house. It survived a fire in the eighteen-eighties and was

incorporated into the later construction.”

Dare glances toward the window as though the building might have changed overnight.

Mom continues. “We also keep the Price family records here. Property documents, correspondence, photographs, architectural plans. The local historical society borrows material for exhibits.”

“You have an archive.”

“We have a fire hazard,” Dad says.

Mack smiles. “I’d love to see it.”

“The Archives?”

“All of it.”

Calla reaches for her coffee. “You may regret saying that.”

Mom looks at Mack for a moment.

Something quiet and thoughtful passes through her expression.

Then she turns to Calla.

“Why don’t the four of you have a picnic in the cove this evening? I’ll pack everything,” Mom says. “You can have a bonfire.”

Mack squeals.

Mom smiles. “The stars are beautiful from the beach when the clouds clear. Mack should see them while she’s here.”