The tarnished brass of the numerals 4B catches the low, amber glow of the hallway sconce, blurring as Naomi Vetch blinks back the grit of a long afternoon. Two years of silence have lived behind that door, a hollowed-out space she’s avoided by keeping her eyes fixed on the scuffed floorboards of her own threshold. Now, the lock clicks, a sound like a bone snapping in the quiet of the pre-war building, and the heavy oak swings open to reveal a child.
He is six years old, wearing a pair of faded blue pajamas that look soft from a hundred washings. Naomi feels the breath leave her lungs in a sharp, cold rush, her hands tightening around the ceramic dish she carries. It is the jawline, the specific tilt of the nose, and the way he stands with one foot tucked behind the other. Then he looks up, tilting his head toward the light, and there it is: a distinct, pale crescent moon birthmark etched into his left temple.
It is the exact mark she kissed every night before the accident, a map of a boy who should be ash and memory. Naomi reaches out, her fingers trembling against the cold air of the hallway, but the boy does not move. A shadow drops over the boy's face as the door to 4B begins to swing wider.
