Free House of Glass by Jen Christie

me a confidence, a relentlessness? What could I even attribute it to? “I think that I am one and the same,” I offered hesitantly, “but my bravery comes and goes, and sometimes I have a hesitation, almost as if I don’t know how to go about getting what I want most.”
    “What is it that you want most?”
    I took a deep breath. There were two answers to his question, one that I could reveal inside the glass house, and one that I was too tentative to say. “I don’t know,” I whispered. “Lots of things. What everyone wants, I suppose.”
    He reflected on my words for a moment. “What? Love?” He laughed cynically. “Tell me, have you ever had a broken heart? Have you ever known despair?”
    “I’ve known despair.” I spoke the words simply, quietly.
    “Really?” Something had changed in him; I could feel the anger. “Have you known the pain of losing someone? To go day in and day out and not know if they are alive or dead? Or suffering?” He snorted. “You don’t know a damned thing about that.”
    “Yes, I do know.” My voice was small and faraway and my throat was tight to even have to say those words. I swallowed. Once. Twice. “My father was lost at sea. So I know the kind of loss you speak of. I know the pain of a loss that never resolves itself.” I peeked at him and found him standing still, holding a pencil in the air, listening to me. “No one can understand that pain, only someone who has been through it. Only we know the pain of never knowing the end. Of that loose end hanging.”
    He put the pencil down and looked at me. For the first time I saw a flicker of something—what was it? Hope? Understanding? Attraction perhaps? “I’m sorry,” he said. “I thought—I didn’t know—”
    “You couldn’t have known.”
    “What happened?”
    “My father was a fisherman and one evening he didn’t return home. There wasn’t a storm or anything. I stayed awake for three days waiting for him. The other fishermen took me in their boats and we roamed the waters for any sign of him or his boat. When they couldn’t look me in the eye anymore, I knew it was hopeless.”
    “That’s a terrible thing.” He looked at me, briefly, a glance above the paper, and again I saw that flicker of emotion in his eyes.
    “It is a terrible thing,” I agreed. “I sat and wondered if his boat was floating in the ocean, broken, and that he was alive, clinging to life, waiting for help that never came. It is the worst thing to wonder about.”
    He sighed and his body shrank away from me, just slightly, but I noticed it. He rubbed his eyes and his face. I could see how tired he was. “I’ve been trying for so damned long. I know she’s dead, of course, but the guilt, all these years the guilt has plagued me. Sometimes I think if I move fast enough and wild enough, it can’t keep up. That’s enough for tonight.”
    “Fine, Mr. St. Claire,” I said, remembering how things would be in the morning.
    “Don’t be foolish after all that has passed between us,” he said. “Call me Lucas.”
    “Okay. Lucas.” His name was heaven to say out loud.

Chapter Five
    He sought me out the next day, knocked on my door after lunch. “You’ll come tonight?”
    I tried to hide my excitement. “I will.”
    “I’ll wait for you in the garden.”
    Later Annie approached that afternoon while we worked. “I saw you last night. I just want you to know. You are on your last days.”
    I couldn’t tell if she was bluffing or not; her eyes didn’t quite glitter with the same triumph of information that she had possessed before.
    “Prove it,” I said, taking a risk.
    “I will. You’ll see. Soon.”
    Anger welled inside me. If only she weren’t here there wouldn’t be any complications. I could meet Lucas and no one would ever know. But I wasn’t completely certain that she did know, and either way I was too far gone to stop.
    After everyone had gone to bed, I slipped out again. Maxie found me before long and