The descending trail from the hills above the city eventually led me to the outskirts of Upper Park, and soon enough I was walking down its cobblestone paths, surrounded by people. I tried my best to keep calm, but I still felt like everyone was looking directly at me. Whenever I happened to meet the eye of a passer-by, my heart skipped a beat. “They know. They know what you did,” my inner voice would say.

Somehow, I made my way to Strickland Avenue, where I could catch the funicular leading to the lower levels of the town. I glanced at the clock tower of a small church. It was already past school hours. My forehead was immediately drenched in cold sweat.

As the funicular descended, I attempted to piece together some kind of explanation for my absence. My parents would wonder why I hadn’t returned home in time, and Ezra’s would as well. There would be questions to answer.

I didn’t get much thinking done. The only thing on my mind was the fact that I would never hear Ezra’s voice again. Tears started rolling down my face – I turned away from the other passengers to hide it, pretending I was intensely focused on something out the window.

The funicular trip and tram ride went by in a haze, and suddenly I was walking up to my house. Here too I felt like everyone was looking at me, but this time it wasn’t just my imagination. People were definitely staring at me, and I could’ve sworn I heard whispers as I passed them by.

At my house, a police car. I took a deep breath and stepped inside.

Four pairs of eyes immediately fixated themselves on my face. My father, my mother and two police officers.

“Archie!” mother shouted as she ran up to me and put her hands on my shoulders. “Thank goodness! We were worried sick!”

“Where were you!?” father exclaimed, sounding more annoyed than concerned. “You should’ve been home hours ago, the headmaster said you missed the whole day of school!”

“If I may, sir,” one of the police officers said calmly. “I understand that emotions are running high at this time, but we have some questions for your son.”

Father just nodded and mother stood aside as the officers stepped towards me.

“Archie, I’m officer Kain,” she introduced herself. “This is officer Cobbett. We would appreciate it if you could answer some questions for us.”

I nodded, trying to mop all my anxiety and fear under the rug.

“Your parents called us after they were informed that you hadn’t showed up in class today. However, some of your fellow students reported seeing you in front of the Academy building this morning. Is this true?”

I swallowed hard.

“Answer the police officer, Archie,” father said sternly. I just nodded my head.

“Were you alone?” officer Kain continued.

“No,” I said, barely audible. If other kids saw me, then they must have seen Ezra with me too – there was no point in lying.

“Who were you with?”

“Ezra Rowse.”

“Good grief, you finally have a friend and they’re putting you up to nonsense like this?” father snapped, but Cobbett just gestured towards him to keep quiet.

“Listen to me very carefully, Archie. I need you to tell me exactly what happened when the two of you left the Academy gate this morning.”

Her face was unreadable, terrifying in how expressionless in was. I don’t know how I managed not to faint.

“We took a tram,” I started, forcing myself to look her in the eyes. “To city hall. Then we took a funicular to the highest level of the city. And then… I lost him.”

“What do you mean you lost him? Can you be more specific?”

“He ran off. I tried to run after him but he went through Maggie’s farmers market and there was no way to pick him out of the crowd. I spent ages looking for him… I looked everywhere on the upper level, but I couldn’t find him.”

“Was there anything unusual in Ezra’s behavior prior to this?”

“Yes,” I said solemnly. “I think… I think he’s been having some serious trouble at home. He just wanted to escape from it.”

Kain and Cobbett exchanged a quick glance and a barely noticeable nod. Then they both faced me directly.

“Thank you for your answers, Archie,” officer Kain said gently. “You’ve been very helpful. If you see Ezra or hear anything from him, please give us a call.”

They left, and I broke down crying in front of my parents.

Ezra obviously never returned home and was pronounced missing. I was completely off the hook – from what newspapers were reporting and people were whispering on the streets, it was a case of a troubled youth running away from a potentially abusive father. We did get a few more visits from the police, asking me if I knew places Ezra frequented or considered safe, but the case stalled without any convincing evidence. The search didn’t cease, but soon enough the news cycle moved on to other topics of the day, and the missing of Ezra Rowse receded from the public eye.

As the situation unfolded, I disappeared in my guilt. I withdrew myself from the world completely. The day after I murdered Ezra, I left the class photo he gave me on a random table in a random classroom. I couldn’t bear to hold it or look at it; just the thought of his smiling, innocent face was enough to make my skin crawl from the disgust I felt for myself.

That was also the last time I ever stepped foot into the Academy. I shut myself off in my nook, resisting all attempts to be forced out of it. I stopped eating and lost a lot of weight, and soon after I fell seriously ill. The chagrin of my parents soon turned to genuine worry, as they started to spend hours outside of my safe space trying to comfort me, pleading for me to come out with their voices cracking. Soon enough I got so weak that doctors had to forcibly pull me out and take me to the hospital. My body got better, but my mind never recovered. I talked to so many doctors that I lost count, but nothing ever helped me heal and move on.

In the end, I left school and found a job doing physical labor, crushing any remaining hopes my parents had for me. From then on, I would live my life as nothing but a spectator, going day to day without any attempt to do anything else other than simply surviving. I never drew anything after that day, not a single sketch. It’s not that I stopped because I was punishing myself – I just didn’t feel like doing it anymore. All of the things that brought me pleasure were meaningless without Ezra. The day that I murdered him, something in my head was completely rearranged so that I could never feel true joy anymore.

In that state of mind, time became a secondary concern: days blended into weeks, weeks into months, months into years. It took me nearly two decades to gather the strength to go visit the well once more. I could only bring myself to stay for a few moments, and I had horrifying dreams of Ezra’s mangled decomposing body the days after, so I never tried it again since.

The only thing that changed through the years was the amount of deep-seeded bitterness that I accumulated within me. Every single happy couple I saw would cause my wounds to re-open. I knew that it was pointless and wrong to hold resentment towards them, but sometimes it felt like they were hurting me simply by existing. In them I saw everything that I never had a chance to become, a better version of oneself that surfaces through the simple act of caring for someone else. It was easier to funnel that pain into anger and throw it at any stable, functioning relationship I encountered than to dwell on it and let it eat away at what was left of me. It’s why I give dirty looks to young lovers when I pass them by on my way home from buying groceries. It’s why I spit at wedding carriages. And it’s why I’m rude to the sweet young man who recently moved in next to me with his husband, even when he tries to help me. He hurts me more than perhaps anyone else because he achieved what I never could – building a happy home with the man he loves.

And here I am, fifty years later. A shriveled, grey husk of my former self, ending one mundane day after the other wishing that I don’t wake up the next morning. Then, regrettably, I do, and have to go through the routine one more time. Buy groceries, return home, read the newspaper, lie down for a rest, have lunch, and wait silently for the night to fall.

It was like this until one particular day, when my routine was interrupted in a way I never would’ve expected. As I sat down and unfolded the daily paper, I froze in shock. Spread across the front page was a photograph of Ezra, with the headline “Body of missing boy found after five decades.”

My body jolted forward as my eyes ran past the lines of text, quickly absorbing them. It was that same young man living next door – he made the discovery. I knew his name because I’d heard him repeat it outside my door after I rejected his offer to help me. Apparently he’s a retired spirit detective – who would’ve known? Evidence made it clear that Ezra’s death wasn’t voluntary, and it was to be investigated as a murder.

The paper just slid out of my fingers and fell to the floor. I sat in my armchair completely still, hunched forward, my eyes fixated on the kitchen wall. My mind began to race. I’d told the police that Ezra ran away because he had problems with his father. They surely got testimonials from his family as well, and they must’ve known about the abuse, the argument, the death threat. The fact that Ezra’s father was a cold and intense man with a gun collection probably didn’t help his case. Altogether, it would all seem to point towards him being the culprit.

Clearly, I had no sympathy for Ezra’s father – he could’ve been put in prison for the rest of his life for the way he treated his son, and I wouldn’t bat an eye. But fifty years had passed and he was no longer alive, so he couldn’t be tried for murder. Nevertheless, his surviving children still had tight connections to Strona’s government. If his good name was to be soiled they would be the ones taking the hit. They would lose their good standing, their influence, their income. It would put them in a hard spot to say the least.

But most importantly, Ezra loved his sister and brother, he told me as much. They were the only reason he would return home after school. If I truly loved him, there was no way I could let them suffer the consequences of something they had no involvement with.

I let out a heavy sigh and slowly get out of my chair. I know what has to be done.

I waddle out of my apartment and walk up to the door next to me.

One more deep sigh, and I knock.