Part One
12 – The Hanged Man

It is one of those clichéd nights – dark and stormy with the wind howling and the rain hurling itself pell-mell against the windows. I put down my pen and sigh heavily, moving some of the dust that sits on the piano as I do so.

I open the window just slightly, just enough so the stench won’t be too awful when they find me. If they find me.

The tape recorder has committed my words to its memory, and the rest of the tapes sit on a shelf, gathering dust. Pretty much like everything else.

The box is waiting for me. I step onto it, slip my head through the noose and close my eyes. My ginger-blonde hair is dishevelled, due to my hands constantly running through it, and my gentle green eyes that so often betray me shut for the very last time.

I step off the box. I’m free.

Part Two
Six of Swords – Passage

“Jesus Christ!”

“What is it, Ern – Oh my God!”

“Call the police, Bea, I think it’s a bit too late for an ambulance, don’t you think? Well, judging by the smell…”

“My God, don’t! Don’t touch him, Ern, that’s for the police to deal with now – c’mon, get away from there!”

Beatrice and Ernest Marsh, the elderly couple that live downstairs from The Hanged Man quickly retreat from the flat with the door left unlocked, just in case anyone should come calling.

Ernest talks to the policeman far more calmly than he feels, while Beatrice makes a pot of tea in the small, outdated kitchen. There’s a dead body upstairs and Beatrice is making tea. How terribly British.

The policeman and woman arrive twenty minutes later, at half past six. The sun is just beginning its descent and Ernest stares out of the window, contemplating what he saw upstairs, and what’s still up there.

He lets Beatrice lead them up the stairs and into The Hanged Man’s flat, choosing instead to wash up the teacups. Ernest’s brother had hung himself, many years ago, and Ernest himself had found him in a situation very similar to that of The Hanged Man – alone in a room, swinging pathetically. Yes. He’d much rather wash up the teacups.

Somewhere around an hour and a half after Ernest and Beatrice had found him, The Hanged Man was put in an ambulance and driven off for his entirely unnecessary post mortem. Around an hour and a half after that, the police and the crime investigation team vacated the premises, not feeling the need to declare “death under suspicious circumstances”.

And somewhere near an hour after that, The Devil arrived, and sighed heavily.

Part Three
15 – The Devil

The Devil could see The Hanged Man swinging, limp, helpless in the centre of the room, even if he had been taken away more than three hours ago. The Devil took a long drag on his cigarette before stubbing it out on the doorframe to the flat.

Him and The Hanged Man hadn’t spoken in months…a year? He’d lost count, forgotten, moved on, but he’d still been summoned to the flat he though he’d never have to see again. It was typical. The Hanged Man can manipulate him even in death, and The Devil is disgusted that he lets him.

The flat stinks. It stinks of dust and memories and self-pity and cigarettes and alcohol and wretchedness. It stinks.

The Devil – long-fingered with cold, deep eyes, a strange stance and awkward build skulks in the hallway outside the flat. He should never have had to come back here.

The phone call…”…And your number was on the suicide note, sir, so we thought we’d better give you a ring. The flat’s been left open for you and the downstairs neighbours will keep an eye out ‘til you come. Were you two close, sir?”

“Once upon a time, yes,” The Devil had replied before ringing off and kicking the back of his sofa.

Now he stands in the doorway, waiting. For what, he doesn’t know, but he’s waiting until he feels the need to go in. Until that time, he looks.

The flat is an Aladdin’s cave of bitterness and nostalgia intermingled – photographs roughly tacked on the wall in a drunken fit of anger – mugs of half-drunk tea sitting patiently on the floor.

The Devil finally enters the flat, and decides to start at the beginning.

Part Four
Ten of Swords – Ruin

As The Devil walks slowly through the flat that used to be so well cared for, his eyes widen at the neglect The Hanged Man has shown to what was once his pride and joy.

The dust is inches thick and has settled on everything, from the carpet to the shelves stacked high with books. Most of those books are filled with The Hanged Man’s neat script, the words that are his own, his very soul.

The kitchen is probably is in the worst state – after all, he didn’t use it. Survived on tap water and dry cereal eaten every once in a while – The Hanged Man had no need for the appliances that are in there.

He used to be such a good cook – Italian food in particular. One could often come home to find him up to his elbows in tinned tomatoes, grinning happily and singing along to the radio. He used to be so joyful. So carefree.

Now, though, in the many months since they had severed ties, The Hanged Man had turned into exactly the type of person he used to want to help. Of course, there were signs of him…changing a few months before The Devil walked out and left. The Hanged Man became manipulative, depressive and selfish – antisocial and miserable.

That’s when the notebooks appeared. He’d sit up until all hours of the night, writing, filling book after book with song lyrics, quotations, poetry, doodles. “Random Thoughts of The Hanged Man” was scrawled on the front page of each, along with a roman numeral indicating which volume you were currently perusing.

Photography, tapes and tarots had been his other obsessions. His deck of tarot cards were dog-eared with use, and he often made comparison between himself and the cards. His favourite had been The Hanged Man. Now The Devil knew why.

Part Five
0 – The Fool

The Devil found the note sitting on top of the piano keys, clearly left there for him.

They’ll call you and you’ll have to come back. I’ve still got you. You know what to do.

And at the bottom there was The Devil’s telephone number. The Devil was incensed by the mocking tone of the suicide note: it was clearly meant to wind him up.

Such a foolish thing – that The Hanged Man still managed to get right under his skin, like a rat manages to squeeze itself into impossibly small holes. It was ridiculous.

And it was even more ridiculous that The Hanged Man knew it.

Part Six
Three of Pentacles – Work

The Devil knew what to do alright. The tapes, the notebooks, the letters – they were all for him. After he had walked out, The Hanged Man had phoned e-mailed followed constantly, saying typing whispering the same thing over and over and over again.

Start at the beginning. Tape number one. Then take the red notebooks – red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet notebooks. Photographs to your left. Then you’ll know.

It must have taken months of near constant work. To amass a library of thoughts the sheer size of the one The Hanged Man had created, well…He must have been very patient, very lonely, or completely insane. The Devil reckoned it was probably all three.

Start at the beginning. Tape number one.

The Devil peered at the shelf of tapes, with the sign “The Death and Life of A Hanged Man” taped above it seemingly very recently. He sighed and pulled the tape with the Roman numeral for ‘one’ on its side and slotted it into the old cassette player, listening to the static before the voice of The Hanged Man started.

Part Seven
21 – The World

I saw you sitting on the step outside the café. You looked so interesting. Your dirty blonde hair was hiding your face, and your hands were clasped tightly around a leather bound journal, that you were feverishly writing in with a fountain pen that’s sitting on your bedside table at the moment.

I thought you were broken inside; that someone had taken your heart and turned it into stone. I thought you were cold, dead.

I knew I wanted to help you.

I approached and you looked up, with barely concealed interest in your eyes. I smiled faintly and introduced myself, and you did the same. We sat on that step for three hours and…twenty-six minutes; watching the late afternoon turn into dusk, then fade into night, talking about nothing yet everything.

There was a pause in The Hanged Man’s monologue as he sighed softly, apparently happy.

I then knew that you needed my help, and I was willing to give you it - you could take everythinganythingall you wanted from me and I'd let you. I knew I'd let you suck me dry and leave me a broken shell of a man. I knew I wouldn't regret it.

I knew you were…extraordinary.

I knew I loved you.

I knew you were my world.

Part Eight
Ace of Hearts – Love

The Devil glared as he paused the tape. Start at the beginning. Of course…when they first met. That was the beginning of the end for both of them – obsession from The Hanged Man and eventual disinterest from The Devil equated to fireworks, suffering and misery. Hoarse throats from screaming. Headaches from glaring. Cold hearts from hating.

Together, they were a perfect lie.

The Devil pressed play.

You bought me flowers. You would say you loved me every morning, after you’d woken me up by kissing my face, and you’d smile at the dopey expression on my face. You read to me. You cooked for me. You loved me. I was so in love with you. We were so in love.

Now you’re gone, and I’m going to remember it all.

The Devil gave the tape player a filthy look – hearing The Hanged Man’s voice sounding so bitter, so filled with hatred a second after it had been nostalgic, happy, even, was a shock.

The Devil used to win all their fights…one way or another. The Hanged Man was never up to it, and, in truth, The Devil enjoyed tearing him apart. He knew he was sick, that destroying the Hanged Man from the inside out was wrong, he knew it was sadistic and something that mental cases did, but he loved it.

The Hanged Man stopped fighting, stopped shouting, became whiny and manipulative and completely dependent on The Devil. He stopped going out. He stopped seeing his family and friends - he cut himself off completely from the rest of the world. He said The Devil was his world, and The Devil would use this infatuation to his shameless advantage, by smiling sweetly at The Hanged Man - by buying him flowers, saying he loved him, reading to him, cooking for him. Loving him.

Yes...The Devil had loved The Hanged Man...once upon a time.

Only then, after perhaps a few weeks of adoration from The Devil, The Hanged Man would find himself constantly ignored, snapped at, told he was worthless. His self-esteem was non-existent.

And everything was The Devil's fault.

Part Nine
Three of Wands - Opportunity

The Hanged Man worked whenever The Devil was out. He'd always liked to write, even though The Devil was better at it than he, but he enjoyed himself nonetheless. The Hanged Man tended to stick with writing out song lyrics and quotations - the words that weren't his own, and therefore only revealed his state of mind when they were noted down.

The Devil fetched a journal down from the shelf - a suede-bound one that was probably expensive - and left the tape rolling in the background. The Hanged Man was currently informing The Devil how much he truly hated him, but The Devil ignored it. He'd heard it all before.

Well, Sir, from the silent dead,
Still I'll try to daunt you;
Ever round your midnight bed
Horrid sprites shall haunt you!
--Robert Burns

The Hanged man had loved Robert Burns, particularly the poem that extract was taken from. Was it 'My Love Nancy'? No...'My Spouse Nancy', that was it! Yes. The pages that poem covered in the poetry book had tea stains on them, as it had been read over and over - usually late at night with a source of caffeine.

...All, except only Love. Love had died long ago.

That one was Rupert Brooke. Definitely. The Devil had loved Rupert Brooke until The Hanged Man had become obsessive over his work and seemingly every poem ever written by him was copied up neatly into notebooks, with doodles running down the side of the page. 'The Funeral of Youth: Threnody', the last line being one of those things that would stay with The Devil forever.

FROM the candles and dumb shadows, and the house where love had died, I stole to the vast moonlight and the whispering life outside. But I found no lips of comfort, No home in the moon’s light (I, little and lone and frightened In the unfriendly night)...

Rupert Brooke again. The Devil glared, the old annoyance at The Hanged Man's constant imitation of him flaring deep inside him. Surely that wasn't normal.

He's such a vile creep.

The Devil laughed then - a loud, merciless laugh at the pathetic way The Hanged Man had written about him like a teenage girl in her diary, storing up his bitter thoughts until it had spilled over into his eventual suicide. He was the lowest kind of thief? Yes, that was a fair assessment.

I could gag you with sweetness until you choke, until you can't breathe, until you beg me for help and I'll just watch you gag on my words and my actions and my thoughts.

The Devil had certainly had first hand experience of The Hanged Man acting that way - he seemed such an innocent, such a victim, but he was suffocating, overpowering, and he didn't even need to break a sweat to be so.

It was then that The Devil wondered where The Hanged Man got all of these quotations from...books? Stories? The Internet? It was probably all three of them, as he doubted The Hanged Man could write anything as powerful as what was scribbled down. He was never particularly clever.

And he laughs. Laughs. Oh, if he had any idea of what I could do to him...

Smirking, The Devil flipped over the page. The Hanged Man had never done anything, couldn't do anything, would never do anything to him. Not now. Not anymore.

Oh, I want him I hate him I love him I loathe him I need him I'm scared of him I'll kiss him I'll kill him. It's too much.

But when he makes me laugh, when he holds me and tells me he loves me, I won't remember any of that. I'll let him hold me and let him destroy me. God, I'm pathetic.

The Devil stands in the centre of the room, holding the journal, shocked at how much The Hanged Man actually knew about what he was doing. The Hanged Man knew what he was doing. He knew. But he stayed. Why? What for?

And The Devil's mind races back to the first part of the tape.

I then knew that you needed my help, and I was willing to give you it - you could take everythinganythingall you wanted from me and I'd let you. I knew I'd let you suck me dry and leave me a broken shell of a man. I knew I wouldn't regret it.

His heart dropped out of the bottom of his stomach. The Hanged Man was the one with the power all along. The Hanged Man had been trying to help him. The Hanged Man had sacrificed himself, his happiness, his sanity, because he thought The Devil needed help.

The Hanged Man was right.

Part Ten
Ten of Pentacles – Protection

Taken from The Hanged Man’s Diary, three months after meeting The Devil.

I think he’s happy. I hope he is. He says I take very good care of him, and he smiles far more than he used to, when I first found him half-frozen on the doorstep to the café.

He’s so fragile. He rarely goes out, but he’ll dash to get the newspaper really early in the morning, when no one’s about.

He told be what his life was like before I found him. He had £30 left in an envelope that he kept under a floorboard in the disgusting excuse for a flat he was forced to pay too much rent on. He’d lost his job, and had about a week until the landlord of his flat would throw him out into the street.

His family thinks he’s dead…he won’t tell me why. He had barely any possessions; the few threadbare clothes on his back and that journal he writes in. The long and short of it is that he was desperate.

He needed help, he still does, and I helped him, am helping him. He’s so fragile.

I think he knows I love him.

The Devil let out a frustrated roar and flung the diary across the room – furious at being reminded of how weak, pathetic, fragile he once was. He’d sworn to himself that he would never, ever turn into that person again, and The Hanged Man had brought it all back to him. Not that he escaped it very often.

How The Hanged Man could possibly remind him – not now, not now, but he has and he can and he will with his tapes and his words and the truth.

Part Eleven
Ace of Swords – Force

Ernest dashed up the stairs to The Hanged Man’s flat and braced his weight against the front door, shoving it open.

He was greeted with the sight of The Devil ripping pieces of paper out of a notebook, tearing them up and throwing them into the air; choking and muttering and kicking anything in sight.

Ernest coughed and The Devil stopped abruptly, staring vacantly at the elderly man.

“I, uh, I heard you yelling, lad.” Ernest took a tentative step forward into the flat, and gagged at the awful smell he didn’t notice earlier on. “Are you alright?”

The Devil continued staring.

“You…you used to live here, with him, didn’t you?” The Devil nodded slowly.

“My God, lad. You used to look so happy.”

And with that, Ernest turned and shuffled out of the flat, with just one backward glance at The Devil.

He was stood stock still in the centre of the room, watching Ernest go with a look on his face that wrenched at the old man’s heart. Ernest thought how unnerved he seemed, blue-grey eyes swirling with emotion, his shoulders slumped and mouth slightly open

He looked terrified.

Part Twelve
Two of Pentacles – Change

The Devil slammed the door after Ernest left, and noticed for the first time that the back was covered with photographs, printed in black and white and carefully arranged with captions underneath them.

Us, in a pub not all too far away, July.

Despite himself, The Devil smiled faintly at the photograph – he and The Hanged Man grinning inanely at whoever had been taking the picture that evening. They’d been so happy, once.

The Devil ran his fingers tenderly over the photographs, smiling gently. All of them held a memory, and, what’s more, a happy one. The empty space where his heart used to be grasped at a sudden warmth and held it there, and slowly, ever so slowly, The Devil felt his heart start to grow back.

Sighing, The Devil peered at the shelf where the notebooks were arranged in colour order. At the very end of the dusty shelf, its brown colour making it almost invisible, was a thick leather bound journal that used to be the only thing he owned in the world.

Fingers fumbling, he pulled it frantically off the shelf and opened it at the first page.

Start at the beginning…

Part Thirteen
10 – Wheel of Fortune

May 2nd
I’m going to be thrown out of my flat in eleven days if I can’t find the money to stay there. I lost my job. No one else will hire me. I’ve got £30 in a brown envelope, the clothes on my back and this journal. I’ve got no future, no prospects, no money, no job, no belongings, no passion, no hope. I may as well be dead.

Funnily enough, I don’t care either way.

May 3rd
I’ve been sitting in this café doorway for five and a half hours. It’s relatively comfortable, the wind isn’t as sharp here, and there’s a lovely smell every time someone opens the door.

What am I going to do? I could sell my body, but that would mean selling my last shred of dignity as well. No, I’m not that desperate. Yet.

May 5th
I met someone today. He wants to help me, and, truth be told, I’ve never needed anyone’s help more than I do right now. He has kind eyes and a nice voice, and he made me smile. I’m valuing that above anything else he said or did, or will say and will do.

I was going to do it. It’s a fifteen minute walk to the canal from this hovel and I was going to do it tonight ten minutes ago right now, but…I’m still here. I stayed.

I stayed because he made me smile. Perhaps I do have a little bit of hope after all.

The Devil shut the journal and put it back on the shelf, the bottom corners of his mouth tugging downward in heartbroken reflection.

He was totally weak when The Hanged Man had found him – found him, cared for him and made him smile until he grew strong once more – stronger than The Hanged Man; far surpassing him in intelligence, looks, charm, talent…everything.

Only now did The Devil appreciate it. Only now could he put his hands meekly in his pockets and toe the carpet like a six year old in trouble and whisper, “thank you.”

Part Fourteen
6 – The Lovers

“Is it on?” The Hanged Man muttered to The Devil as he poked the tape recorder.

“Of course it’s on, you fool,” The Devil whispered fondly. “You just pressed record!”

“Alright, alright…so, this is, well, us, September 1999, talking to you, sometime in the future.”

“Unless your curiosity is piqued and you can’t help but listen to it while I’m at work,” The Devil said, laughing slightly.

“You shush,” The Hanged Man reprimanded, grinning and cuffing The Devil round the head.

“Argh! Abuse! See, this is evidence, mate, it’s all going onto the tape. Do you want to be eternally remembered as a wife-beater?”

The Hanged Man snickered.

“You’re not my wife, you prat, now shut up and tell the tape about yourself.”

“Are we going to reveal our names or remain all elusive, like a…secret agent or something?”

“Oh, honestly…”

The Devil let out an affronted snort and widened his eyes.

“Don’t you roll your eyes at me! Alright then, I’m going to remain an enigma. I have bluey-grey eyes and I’m five foot something-or-other. My hair’s this daft blondey-brown colour and I have weirdly long fingers, but you can’t see any of that, so…” The Devil tailed off.

“Why don’t you just tell them what you’re like? You know…what you like doing and everything?”

“Well thank you, Captain Obvious, for that amazing suggestion. I was just getting round to that bit! Yes, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, I like to write and cook and smoke and play football, and…all sorts. I like acting, as well. Also, I’m pretty bummed out that the world’s meant to end in a few months as well.”

The Hanged Man laughed. “That ‘The Millennium is going to kill us all off’ thing is just crap. Anything else to declare?” he asked, scratching his chin.

“Not really. Apart from the fact that my friend here hasn’t shaved in four days, and is currently sporting a rather impressive beard, which looks somewhat like a small dead rodent stapled to his face.”

“Oh, thanks for that!” The Hanged Man said in mock affront, flicking the end of The Devil’s bizarrely shaped nose.

“See, you’re at it again, wife-beating…and anyway, it’s no trouble, none at all. Your turn now.”

The Hanged Man giggled stupidly.

“Aye, I suppose so. Well, I have strawberry-blonde-“

“Ginger!”

“Strawberry-blonde hair and very sexy green eyes and I’m just the right height to reach the middle shelf.”

“That translates as ‘I’m a midget’ for those of you unfamiliar with him,” The Devil whispered conspiratorially to the tape recorder.

“Oi! I am not a midget!”

The Devil and The Hanged Man kept up their good-natured banter whilst the recording of the tape went on. Once they had filled the one side with rambling, The Devil asked,

“What’s going on side B?”

“I’m going to stick some songs on there in a bit.”

“Ah, right. What are we actually doing this for?”

“To remember all the fun we have together…how much I love you. Just…to remember.”

They both paused in what they were doing and smiled at each other, suddenly shy.

“Put the photos in then,” The Hanged Man said, gesturing to a small pile of copies they’d had made.

Later that evening, The Devil and The Hanged Man sealed the box and put it at the very back of the airing cupboard.

Part Fifteen
11 – Justice

The Devil’s face wrinkled in pain as he remembered. He should never have come back here – it wasn’t right, not after all the pain and the lies and the tears and the screaming. It hurt to remember the good times they’d had, and they were plentiful, even if they all took place in a short amount of time.

Remembering the bad times was easy. It didn’t hurt, it didn’t make him cry, and he’d managed to forget that he and The Hanged Man had loved each other. Remembering the good times was clichéd, gut-wrenching, agonising, ‘rusty knife in your stomach’ kind of pain.

Choking on the dust, The Devil missed out the other tapes on the shelf and snatched the last one off, slamming it into the tape player. The Hanged Man’s voice, previously so bitter, so hurt and full of anguish, was now just…sad. It wasn’t melodramatic or over the top, it was the plain truth and that hurt more than anything.

“I’ll only stop when I’m finished. I’m…I’m so sorry. I’ve got to do it though, you’ve got to remember me, please, please remember me, it’s all I want from you. I’m so sorry. I’ve got to…I’ve got to finish this. I’m nearly there now, a couple more weeks and it won’t hurt anymore, it’s not your fault, I don’t blame you, I’m weak and I’m sorry and I’m wretched and I just want you to remember me, could you do that, please? I’ve got to finish this. I’m so sorry.”

The Devil dumped his angular form heavily onto the filthy floor. Sprawled on his knees, clutching a photograph of the two of them, he nodded as the tape continued rambling. He nodded, and finally let the tears fall.

Part Sixteen
Eight of Hearts – Sacrifice

The Devil finished packing his things into his rucksack, and glanced at the sealed letter left on the bedside table. In it, he’d asked for forgiveness for leaving, for being so controlling and cruel, and sincerely written that he hoped The Hanged Man could move on, get his own life back, and start living, and not just existing.

In his heart, The Devil knew that that wasn’t possible. He knew The Hanged Man would find him, because he always did, and he’d try to persuade The Devil to come back with him, to come home and they’d be happy…enough.

The Devil knew it was not gallant sacrifice, it wasn’t chivalrous or noble, but he had to do it. He had to leave. Slowly, he and The Hanged Man were pulling each other down, deeper and deeper into doomed destruction, with only one way out.

One of them had to leave.

When they’d talk, they would reassure each other that they still wanted to be around one another, try and convince themselves with words. Their actions, the glares and mutters and poorly concealed sobs from the direction of the locked toilet door, however, would contradict that.

Someone had to leave.

The Devil checked he had everything one last time, and patted the letter for reassurance he was doing the right thing whilst The Hanged Man slept on, oblivious. He sighed at the pile of notebooks on The Hanged Man’s side of the bed, filled with bitterness, and pressed a kiss to his mussed ginger hair. The last kiss.

The Devil walked quickly and quietly out of the flat without a backwards glance to the sleeping figure. That way, he’d be able to replace the happiness with tears, the fun with loud arguments, The Hanged Man’s gentle, shy smile with a glare and their love with mutual hatred.

The cigarette that he lit up once he was on the street offered no comfort.

He had to do it. He had to leave.

The Devil sighed, hailed a taxi, and was able to start forgetting.

Epilogue
Three of Swords – Sorrow

“I’m sorry for your loss, Sir.”

The Devil nodded politely and stepped out of the small room into the warm spring sunshine, The Hanged Man’s ashes tucked protectively under his arm.

“C’mon, you,” he whispered, and wandered off to the top of the hill.

There he stood, letting the breeze whirl about him like a lover’s strong embrace, one that he’d once had but lost, through his own fault.

That morning, he’d finished cleaning The Hanged Man’s flat and restoring it to the way it once was. In the two months since Ernest and Beatrice had found The Hanged Man, The Devil had carefully filed all of the notebooks and put the photographs in albums to preserve them.

He’d listened to the tape they had made near The Millennium near constantly – an hour and a half of happiness that he could relive over and over again was almost as precious a gift as the smile The Hanged Man had given him on the day they met.

Now everything was finished and he was ready. The Devil twisted the lid of the jar of ashes off gently with spidery fingers and reached in, letting the fine dust run through his digits. He scooped up a handful and threw them into the air, watching as they blew away and appeared to vanish.

*

The evening was chilly, and the stone of the bridge cool to the touch as The Devil watched the rather unimpressive sunset through tired eyes. The wind had picked up since the morning, and The Devil’s t-shirt wasn’t enough to keep him warm. It didn’t really matter anyway.

He swung himself up onto the edge of the bridge and peered down into the water below. It was fast, deep, and probably freezing.

The Devil bit his lip and ran his hands through his hair, and shut his eyes before stepping forward with one foot.

Unexpectedly, the wind changed direction with such force that The Devil was forced to step back, shocked and frightened. He was caught and held by the wind, which, for some reason, suddenly felt like wings and a tender, warm embrace that he remembered from many, many months ago.

And then there was a whisper.

Start at the beginning…

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