You are there. You glide through the rusted, iron gate. The air is cold, dark. Ex­cept for a few stray dogs, hunt­ing through the fallen leaves, the cas­tle grounds are des­o­late. Thirty feet above the ground, you fly for­ward, head­first. You are weight­less. Halfway up one of the white stone tow­ers, a small win­dow shines green. The rest of the cas­tle is dark. The green win­dow is far away, but in a mo­ment, you are there. You smile as you watch the latch at the bot­tom come un­done, and the win­dow slides up­wards and opens, and you slip in­side.

The walls of the room are emer­ald green, with a mil­lion cracks that in­ter­con­nect, like the skin of an old painter’s hand. The room is al­most empty. A couch, made of wicker, with red cush­ions, up against one wall, and just then, you no­tice by the fur­thest wall, a woman is stand­ing with her back to you, though you can see the book in her hand. She has long blonde hair, and sliv­ers of red light catch your eye from the ru­bies in her blue gown. She’s been gone so long – five years – but you still rec­og­nize her from the way she stands – one hand on her hip, one leg bent at the knee – and a rush of warmth fills you up, though only for a mo­ment, as when she turns to­ward you, though you haven’t made a sound, she has on a sad, know­ing smile. You are rush­ing to­wards her, and she closes her book care­fully on her fin­ger, sav­ing her place, and in in­stant you are fly­ing through her. You thought her weight would stop you, but you are both weight­less and you do not even make a rip­ple in her gown.

“I’m sorry, my dar­ling,” she says, reach­ing to­wards you and catch­ing her­self, pulling her hand back­ward, and you re­mem­ber the way she would tuck the hair be­hind your ear, read­ing aloud to you when you were much younger.

Just then, you take a step back, sud­denly notic­ing the red stain on her gown, halfway up her ribcage. It is dark red, fresh, and you re­mem­ber wait­ing with your fa­ther in the hos­pi­tal lobby, him pac­ing and fid­dling with the skin be­tween his thumb and index fin­ger, wait­ing for the surgery to be over.

“Are you okay?” you ask.

“I’m fine, I’m fine, honey,” she says, smil­ing more fully now. “How are you? I want to know about you… ” she fin­ishes, and brings the book she is still hold­ing up to her chest.

You pause. Look­ing over her shoul­der, you no­tice there are three wide shelves of books set in the wall. The books are all dif­fer­ent heights, some thin, some thick. A few, leather-bound. Oth­ers, their spines weak, barely able to keep their pages from falling onto the grey stone floor.

The gold writ­ing on the book she is hold­ing catches your eye, and you see her smile. You are read­ing the words now, “Eva Co­lapi­etro and The Ar­gen­tine Locket,” and she an­gles the book so you can bet­ter see the cover.

“What –” you start, and stop.

“It’s about you, sweet­heart,” she says, smil­ing. “Of course it’s about you.”

“Is it good?”

“It’s very good.”

“Well, how does it end?” you ask, reach­ing for the book. She lets you pull it out of her hand, and you flip open the back cover to read the last page, and she laughs.

You are read­ing – “and Eva es­capes her cap­tors, through the canals of Venice, with the locket around her neck” – when she in­ter­rupts you.

“There’s just one thing, Eva.”

You look up at her, and she is point­ing to­wards the book­shelves.

“They’re all about you,” she says, and you step closer and read the names of some of the oth­ers: “The Fab­u­lous Life of Eva Co­lapi­etro,” “Eva and The White Rose,” “Eva, The Ac­coun­tant.”

“Which one is the right one? I need to know, Mom… I need to know what hap­pens next,” you say.

She gives you a look you re­mem­ber well – eye­brows scrunched, lips pursed, try­ing to not smile, ap­prais­ing.

“Come see more of the cas­tle,” she says, after a pause, and turns, look­ing back at you over her shoul­der, and you fol­low her through the arched door­way in the back wall of the room.

She is lead­ing you down a wide mar­ble stair­case, yel­low light flood­ing the cen­ters of the steps, heavy shad­ows on the sides, and you re­mem­ber being very young, on the back of her bi­cy­cle, in the late evening — after din­ner, or later, if you couldn’t sleep — rid­ing along the dirt roads of the coun­try­side, no one else around. She would hear you laugh­ing, and slow down and lean the bike against a tree, and you would ex­am­ine the way an acorn, at your feet, fits per­fectly in its shell, be­fore pick­ing it up and pulling it apart. Now, the huge great hall below, the suits of armor you pass at the foot of the stairs, seem to be­long to just the two of you.

It is when you see the body on the mar­ble floor of the hall, crum­pled, fif­teen feet away, but yet, the out­line solid, the col­ors full — the black hair, the t-shirt ripped a bit at the neck — that you know you are wak­ing up. Your shoul­ders and neck tense. You reach for the mar­ble ban­is­ter at your side to catch your­self, but is hazy and your hand passes right through it. You stum­ble down the last few steps, brac­ing for the fall, but the land­ing is soft, and, open­ing your eyes, you see grass and dirt against your cheek. You turn, and the chan­de­lier hang­ing from the cas­tle ceil­ing and the walls of giant, un­even stones are fad­ing out of focus. Your heart pounds as trees, al­most translu­cent in the moon­light, loom over­head.

Mo­tion­less, you sit and wait for the scene to change com­pletely, the shapes to stop re­or­ga­niz­ing them­selves. It is cold. Your skirt is damp with mud. You brush off the green streak of grass and peb­bles stuck to your leg, under the cut on your shin. Turn­ing, you scan the sky for a land­mark, try­ing to fig­ure out where you are — and there it is. Life­less in the grass, on his side, ten feet away, his back to you. Dried blood is caked in his black hair and on the back of his grey t-shirt.

You close your eyes, and open them. Still there. Your hands are in your hair now. Your palms press against the knots in your tem­ples. You close your eyes again, and open them. And again. It is get­ting harder to see, through the tears. All around you are trees, their leaves red and or­ange and crisp, and thick, green bushes, and to your left, a clear­ing be­fore a cliff. You hear leaves rus­tle in the light wind, and be­hind you, a bird chirps twice.