Epilogue
There is a house.
Its hedges are overgrown and weeds took over the flowers. Its floors are dusty except a lone trail of footsteps winding into the bathroom and up the stairs. The air still smells of love, stale and almost gone, and the intruder's scent forms a clear path.
Mio covers the photograph with a damp warm cloth, and holds it there until she feels it start to cool. When she uncovers the paper it is wet and simple to peel, and it comes off clean, unbelievable easy after her days of desperate scrubbing that yielded no results. She holds the scraps in her palm, breathes in the scent, and tosses them out the window.
There is a crack.
It stands alone on a bare wall, stark against the simple white. It runs down onto the floor, down the stairs and into the garden. It runs into the girl.
For Mio, the crack is still there. But she likes to think that after the ghosts are gone it is a little better. She likes to think that while it will never close, it is starting to heal.