It was fully light out when I woke up the next morning, and the light seemed a bit off for morning, without that tiny hint of dew and fog that morning light carries in it. The light streaming (people always say that: streaming. But it's such an apt word, really. Especially for that day, when the light was quite literally swirling into the room, so bright I could see each dust particle in the air) into the room strong and vibrant, much more like afternoon sun than anything else.

I struggled upright, my body feeling heavy, but my mind clear and alert. I peered over at the clock on the bedside table and reared back in surprise. It was 12:17. In the afternoon.

When in the world had I last slept as late as this? When in the world had I last slept past seven in the morning?

I slid out of bed and moved cautiously to the door, pressing my hand against it briefly before gathering my courage to push it open. The house was, of course, empty, Seth's bedroom door wide open, as though inviting me in.

Okay, I know. But come on. If he had wanted me to stay out, he could have at least closed the damn door, right? Right. Obviously.

I fairly crept into his room, as though suspecting booby traps to trip me up. Nothing, of course, and I moved, feeling a teensy bit guilty, but mostly just curious, to peek into his drawers, checking the window to make absolutely certain the shades were closed.

I pulled open the top drawer of his dresser to find...socks. I even moved them around a bit, and nothing. No letters. Oh, Lord, of course that's what I was after.

The other three drawers held only clothes, also, and though I was disappointed, I found myself running my hands over his undershirts, feeling their fabric under my fingers.

There was a desk in the corner of the room, and I moved to it, pulling open one of two drawers in the side. Pencils, papers, but nothing that looked like it had anything to me. Mostly notes on livestock and crops, or reminders to "Go to bank Friday."

The second drawer was filled with the same things.

I went to the wardrobe and looked through his shirts, vests, coats, and shoes, seeing nothing of interest, although the blood-red shirt he had worn on Christmas Eve was there, and I held my hand to its shoulder, gripping the hanger underneath, for a long moment.

One place left. The bedside table. I went over to it, only to find that stupid, fucking, moronic thing didn't have a goddamned drawer. I'm sorry, but what in the hell? As I made to turn, though, something caught my eye: the candle I had given him for Christmas. It was placed there, right next to where he slept each night, a box of matches next to it, the wick clearly having been lit multiple times, the candle itself partially melted and out of shape. I inhaled, and—yes—I could smell the scent of the candle in the air, a spice of cinnamon mixed with a scent that always reminded me of birthdays, how the air smelled after you blew out the candles and the smoke swirled into the air.

I straightened and stood next to his bed in only my nightgown, my bare feet on the smooth wooden floor, feeling an enormous feeling of being let down. There's nothing worse than snooping only to find absolutely nothing, especially when you know there's something juicy to be found.

Heaving a huge, put-upon sigh of long-suffering, I made to leave the room, crossing the floor, figuring I may as well have a bath and get myself really, truly cleaned up. As I crossed by the foot of the bed, I felt it—a tiny unevenness in the wood, a small imperfection that I would have not noticed had I not been barefoot. I immediately stopped and crouched down, and there it was: a loose floorboard.

Of course there was a loose floorboard. Or, well, rather, of course Seth had created a loose floorboard. Leaders tended to have them—we tend to be, as a group, secretive and private, and I know for a fact he'd used his in Brooklyn rather frequently, though we never discussed it. I had seen him glancing at the spot on the floor where his was countless times, and could only imagine what had been in there.

I stuck my fingers in the crack and pulled, lifting the board easily and placing it gently on the floor next to my feet. And there they were: a stack of letters. I pulled them out to see that each and every one of them had my name in the header. As I flipped back, I realized that the letters he had written before he had come home, before he had learned my name, were addressed to Gleam, which made me feel both strange and nostalgic.

I almost missed it completely; I was so interested in the letters. But as I made to replace the floorboard, I saw it. A scrap of paper that had been placed underneath the letters. I could see Seth's handwriting on that paper, too:

Lydia,

Just put them back when you're done.

Seth

I stared at his little note, then let out a burst of disbelieving laughter. Oh, God, who was I kidding? He didn't shut his door because he knew I would have come in anyway. And he didn't lock the letters away or remove them completely because he wanted me to read them.

I managed to hold off on reading the letters until after I had taken what was quite possibly the fastest bath I'd ever experienced, applied my cosmetics with a quick, practiced hand, and shook out my hair before dressing in a white cotton dress with elbow-length sleeves and satin bows at the cuffs and my left hip. I left my feet bare and went outside, moving one of the chairs into the sun, where I settled down to read and let my hair dry in the warm light.

The first letter he had ever written me was dated January 3, 1902, and I wondered what I had been doing when he had sat down to pen this, where I had been, who I had been with. January of '02 had been before anything had even transpired between Ben and I, back when Seth's return would have much less complicated, would have perhaps been less tragic, less of a catalyst for so much disaster. I wish I could say that I remembered a strange feeling on that day, a niggling of being thought of, but I didn't. I couldn't remember that day at all, and so it must have been nothing but a normal, anonymous day. Strange, really, how that could be.

"Gleam," it read, "I wish I had a name for you. A real name. I wish that when I pictured you in my head, I didn't have to call you by a name that wasn't really yours. I feel like those newsy names, they keep us anonymous, and only if we know each other's real names do we have any real connection. It's ridiculous—I feel like you're the one I'm the most connected to, except maybe Bourbon, and I have no idea what your name is. I know his name, of course; Ben. I wonder sometimes where he is, if you've stayed in touch with him. I don't know why you would, but I always wonder.

It's been two weeks since I was offered the foreman job, and when I took it, I didn't think it would be like this. The job is great, don't get me wrong. But since I became a leader again, it's like I slipped back into that old world, where you were always close by. I feel closer to you now than I have in the last two years, but I don't know a thing about who you are now. It terrifies me that you could even be dead, and I wouldn't even know, though I can't really believe that. I have the feeling that if something happened to you, I would know, that the world would feel different.

I'm glad I left. This is a good life for me. But these days, all I can see when I look at anything or anyone is your face. I wish I could believe I could go back, find you, and fix all the mistakes I made. I wish I could believe that there's a chance you still loved me.

I can still barely believe you loved me in the first place. I didn't do anything to deserve it. I'd like to think I'm a better man now, that I've grown up and become the man you needed me to be.

But I don't think I could stomach going back and having you hate me, like I'm sure you do now, so I suppose these letters I'll never send will have to be enough. Hopefully with these letters I can trick myself into believing you still think about me."

I stared down at the letter, marveling at how open he was, how honest. But of course he would be—everyone, even men like Seth, feels the same emotions, has the same kinds of fears and vulnerabilities. Here, in these letters that he had thought no one would ever read, there was no reason for him to shield himself like he did so very often in his real life.

Throughout the next letters, written very nearly every other day, I read about his life, and learned about the men of the farm, which ones lived on the property, and which ones lived in town with wives and families. I learned about crops he had planted, animals he had bought, and experienced his sadness at losing a man the previous summer during an accident involving a nasty piece of farm equipment. The last letter before he had returned to the City was dated December 20, the day before he had arrived in the City, two days before I had seen him for the first time.

"Gleam," it said, the writing a little messier, more rushed than most of the others, "I leave tomorrow morning. I keep telling myself I'm going back to take care of my mother, to be with her while she dies, but the truth is, I'm going back to find you. I don't know how long it'll take to find you, but if you're still in that city, I think I'll know. I don't think it'd feel the same if you weren't in it.

I'm scared. Even writing it down makes me feel like a pathetic moron, but there it is. I'm scared to see you, and scared of what will happen when I do. I'm scared I won't find you, and will have to come back here without any answered questions.

I can't even think of what I have to do with my mother. I don't know what to do. I don't...I haven't thought about her in a long time, at least not on purpose, but I have to admit that when I see little boys in town with mothers who stoop down in the middle of the walk to hug them, kiss them smack on the lips, it makes me...it hurts like a punch to the gut, because I can't imagine having had that.

I never told you about my mother. I guess if I find you I'll have to tell you. Knowing you, you'll beat it out of me whether I want to tell you about it or not.

I want you to know. I don't know how to tell you, or tell anyone, what she did to me, or how it made me feel. How do you tell someone your own mother hates you? How do you tell anyone that her dying feels like being released from a prison?

How can I possibly tell you that despite all that, a part of me wants her to care about me? How do you tell someone something that weak?

I have to find you. I can't go back and not at least see you. Even if all you do is smack me in the face, it'll be enough."

And then, the very next letter, written January 7, 1903, not soon after he had left, another letter.

"Lydia,

I can't even tell you how good it feels to be able to write that down. That's about the only thing that feels good right now. I feel like I'm not even alive right now, like I'm barely awake, just kind of stumbling through my days.

I can't believe that after everything we went through last month, that I left again. I can't fucking believe that I almost had you, that I almost had you loving me, and then...

He's dead. Ben is dead. The words on the paper don't look real. It's like those words can't make sense. But...it has to make sense, because it's real. He's dead, and when he died, he took you with him.

I can't even believe I'm thinking something so horrible, but I don't think you'd disagree that when Ben died, he made himself irresistible. A tragic hero. You lost him, and it made you realize how much you loved him.

And I can't even hate him, because you can't hate a ghost, let alone Ben. Ben is completely impossible to hate, which makes it all worse. He won you by dying, and I can't even resent him for it.

I can't even resent you, as much as I want to. I wish I could just write you off, decide I'm better off without someone like you, someone who would play with me like you did. I wish I could even be mad. But I can't, because I forced you to toy with me, forced you to participate in this game that didn't end the way any of us expected it. I can't even be mad because I deserved it. I played you, too, so long ago, and I guess this is my just reward for having hurt you. You got to hurt me.

I wish I were a better person, because if I was, I would say that I would take it all back if Ben could live, would let him be with you as long as he was okay, as long as he was alive. But I don't think that's true. If it came down to a choice between you and Ben, I would always choose you. I think he would have done the same."

I struggled to take that in, to process the contents of that letter, where he as good as admitted that, though he cared deeply about Ben, and was as shaken and affected by his death as anyone, that he wouldn't take back loving me, playing the game to win me, even if it had meant that Ben could have survived.

I was instantly put off, immediately bristled with hurt, but slowly, it came to me—he was right. Would Ben have taken back anything he had done if the tables had been turned and it had been Seth who had died? I don't think he would have. I think, in the end, Ben too would have felt that way, and so how could I fault Seth?

There were a few more letters, fewer now than the previous year. It seemed that writing to me had become too difficult, and so this year's letters only numbered about once a month. February's was short, one line: "I don't know what to say here anymore, because I can't even think of what I would say to your face."

March's letter, dated a few days before I had discovered this pregnancy, was also short, but angry. "I want to hate you. I want to go back to the City and shake you, tell you off for being so stubborn, for being so stupid. I want to make you see what's right in front of you, waiting for you."

April's letter, the last one, was longer, and less of a rant than the previous two.

"Lydia,

This is the first time I've written down what Ben said to me that day. I think about it every single day, can't seem to get his last words to me out of my head. Other than some of the things you said to me, I've never been able to recall someone's words verbatim. They're the reason I've done all this, after all, and I hope I made the right choice.

If it had been anyone else, I would have worried about being sabotaged at the last moment, but it was Ben. Ben, who would never have wanted you to be unhappy, and if you really had to be without him, forever, would have wanted us to work this out. I have to believe that, otherwise I have no idea where to go from here.

I'm all out of order here.

I don't think I've ever felt so much dread in my life as when I walked into that room. I expected him to kick me out, but when he saw me, he actually kind of smiled. I couldn't believe how broken he looked in that bed. I felt like I had been kicked in the throat, like I could hardly breathe.

I didn't know what to say, and I don't think he did either, so I just stood there, holding onto the foot of the bed, looking at him. I don't need to write down how he looked—I can't get it out of my head, and I'm sure you can't either.

I wasn't in there for so long because we had such a long talk. It was because neither one of us knew what to do, and so we did nothing. It was at least fifteen minutes before he broke the silence.

"When I die, she'll shut you out." I went to sit at the side of the bed and didn't say anything. I knew he wanted to tell me this, needed me to understand. "She's gonna decide that she's in love with me after I'm dead. If this were you it'd be the same. She'll shut you out."

"How do you know?" I asked him, and he actually kind of laughed, which for some reason made me sad. I'd heard him laugh so many times, and couldn't believe that would probably be my last time.

"You know it too, Conlon," he said, "You know she will. She's gonna decide she's in love with me and that she can't be with you because it wouldn't be right."

"So what do I do, then?"

"Let her. Don't force her to come out of it. Don't make her do anything. She'll never listen to you if you try and tell her what's good for her, Lydia never does. Let her shut you out. Leave if you have to. Give her a way to get a hold of you, and just wait. I promise you that one day, that girl will see how much she loves you come running to you."

"How do you know?" I asked again. I was actually kind of awed at how much knowledge of you he seemed to have, so much more than I did.

"Because that girl will always love you," he said simply, and that was it. "I'm sorry we spent all this time battling it out like this. If I could go back, well..."

"Neither of us would do it any differently," I said, grinning, and he managed a smile.

"No," he agreed, "But I am sorry we didn't get to...I'm just sorry. I really do love you, man."

That almost broke me right there. I would have thought hearing a guy say that to me would have felt awkward, but it didn't. It just felt...I can't even describe it. It was just...right.

He started to cough, and I could feel him starting to fade, and knew you needed to get in there, so I did what anyone would have done for a brother: I leaned down to hug him, and for the first and only time in my life, laid a kiss on a man's cheek and told him I loved him.

And that was it. He was right. You shut me out—I could see it in your face at the hospital: you were already pulling away. After he died and you did everything you could to push me away, it made me feel like I was dying, too.

I needed you. He was my friend. He was my right hand, and he...he had been the only constant in my life for six years, the only guy I always knew I could count on. We had drifted, yeah, but it still hurt.

I know you were hysterical and sad, and didn't mean to do it, but I didn't just want to be there for you to make you feel better. I wanted to be there because I needed you, too.

But I let you shut me out, even though it damn near killed me. And I left.

I can't believe I left. I'm giving it another three months, and if you don't make contact with me, I can't wait anymore. I'll have to go back and find you, and fuck what Ben said, or what you want.

I need you, and you'll just have to deal with it."

In a daze, I got up, my hair dry now, the top of my head fairly stinging with the heat from the sun, and went inside, placing the letters back in the floor. I stood in Seth's room for a long moment, not moving, not blinking, my eyes out of focus.

In my bare feet, I ran out the door and through the orchard, my skirts clinging to my legs as I ran. I burst through the other side of the orchard, pushing leaves aside, and was met with a, "Jesus Christ!" as I nearly collided with the very man I was looking for.

"What's wrong?" he said, catching my expression, and I couldn't even answer. I looked down at the tools in his hands and could only assume he was on his way to fix some part of some kind of building, but I reached out and took them out of his hands, placing them on the ground and pulling him back the way I had come, still running.

He didn't even protest, just jogged along behind me, and we passed through the vacant orchard before coming upon the small yard before his house, where I stopped and turned to face him, panting.

He looked both worried and confused, looking down at me as though he didn't know what to expect.

"I read them," I said finally, and his face tightened with embarrassment.

"You found them already?" he asked, and I could hear a grudging respect in his voice. "What are you, some kind of magician?"

"Yes," I said impatiently waving my hand. "I...I'm so sorry," I said, and his face contracted with consternation.

"Sorry for what?" he asked, and I stepped forward, taking his forearms in my hands.

"I'm sorry," I repeated. "I'm so sorry I wasn't there for you when..." I looked away and cleared my throat. Enough. Ben deserved to be spoken of, to have his name said out loud. "When Ben died. I wasn't thinking about how you felt at all. It didn't even cross my mind, and that's just..."

His face held no anger, but his eyes flashed just briefly in memory at how I had treated him. "It's fine, Lydia," he said, placating me, but I wasn't having it.

"No, Seth," I said, taking another step forward and releasing his arms to take his face. His fingers brushed my hips, but did not seek purchase on them. I put my palms on either side of his face, feeling the stubble on his cheeks prickle the sensitive skin, felt the short hairs behind his ears on my fingertips. "It's not okay. It's terrible. I was terrible, and I'm so sorry."

He looked at me for a long moment, and I felt my stomach jump with a mix of nervousness and excitement at being so near to him, at actually having that face under my hands.

"What do you want me to say, Lydia?" he said finally, and shook his head slightly.

"I don't care what you say. Just...don't tell me it was okay, because it wasn't. It was one thing for me to be unsure of us, but it was inexcusable for me to not think of how you were feeling about Ben." I paused, remembering. "And I didn't. I don't think it once crossed my mind to make sure that you were okay."

"He was my best friend once," he said finally, and his eyes blazed. I dropped my hands, but rested them on his wrists, keeping him close to me. "Jesus, Lydia, I know you were sad, but what the fuck?" He threw up his hands and took a step back. "I fucking needed you and where the hell were you? Pushing me the fuck away, that's where."

My diaphragm was so tight I could hardly breathe. I felt absolutely monstrous, but also...a little victorious. I had forgotten what it felt like, being with this foulmouthed man who didn't spent too much time worrying about my girlish feelings to tell me when I was being an asshole.

I didn't know what else to do, so I did the only thing I could think of: I stepped forward, seizing his wrist and yanking him forward, pulling his arm so that he had no choice but to put it around me, and put my arms around his neck, forcing him to bend slightly so I could press our cheeks together, one hand on the back of his head.

"I'm so sorry, Seth," I said again, and he sighed and tightened both arms, pulling me to him. I could feel the heat from his sun-warmed clothes through my dress, feel the sunlight in his hair, on the back of his neck. We stayed that way for a long while, and when we pulled away, he searched my face.

"I have to get back to work. I brought in some stuff for us to have dinner here, if you want," he said, sounding a little unsure.

"Dinner is good," I said, my voice soft. "I'll make it."

He nodded and looked me over again. I looked back at him, feeling steadier, and took in, once again, his strong face, the angles of his features. He turned to go, but stopped before he'd gotten halfway around. "Do you miss him?" he asked, not looking at me.

I could not lie. "I miss him every day," I said, and he nodded again.

"Did you miss me?" he asked, his teeth going immediately to the inside of his cheek, though his eyes were hard, as though he didn't care either way.

I still could not lie. "I missed you every day," I said, then rushed on as he turned fully to go, stopping him in his tracks. "I sometimes felt like I had imagined you. There was nothing of you left. And then..." I looked down, at my own body. "I found your baby," I said, liking the imagery that turn of phrase conjured, as though I had stumbled upon something that had been there, waiting for me. "And she made me feel alive."

Seth did not turn back around, but walked away, tossing, "He, Lydia, he," over his shoulder, and I smiled, thinking maybe another Seth Conlon in the world wouldn't be the worst thing.