"Maman, what was that about?" Lucien asked.

Genevieve Blake turned back, having caused the door to close. She had not closed it herself, of course. But she had other ways of interacting with the mortal world.

She smiled at her son and walked back to sit on the sofa beside him. Lucien knew to be patient, to not repeat his question. He did not recall this trait of hers from his childhood, but over the years, he had come to learn that she was a very mysterious woman. She kept her secrets and was rarely very forthcoming. He never quite knew why. She probably would not answer him if he ever tried to ask.

"Lucien, that woman is very important," Genevieve explained.

He regarded his mother curiously. "I can't imagine why. She's the housekeeper, isn't she? Why did you let her see us?"

But Genevieve just maintained her serene smile. "The time is coming for your father to join me," she explained. "I shall be away from you while I spend my time with him. I do not want you to be alone, mon petit."

Lucien frowned. "Is he really that bad?" He knew his father was sick. Maman had told him what she had learned from the nurse that cared for old Thomas Blake. It was still odd for him to think of his father as old. The last time Lucien had seen his father had been nearly thirty years ago. Before his medical training, before going right to enlist in the army and going far away to Singapore. Before his life changed irrevocably.

Genevieve's smile fell and she looked down at her hands clasped elegantly in her lap. "He will not last the week," she said sadly. "He is fading fast, and I cannot bear to see him this way."

"But then he'll be with you, won't he?"

She lifted her head as tears started to fall from her eyes. "Yes. But he was not ready to go yet. There was so much he did not get to do."

"The same can be said for you," Lucien pointed out.

Genevieve began to shake with sobs. Lucien's heart ached for her. He reached out to take his beloved mother in his arms to comfort her, forgetting the truth of them of a moment. His hands went right through her, as though he touched nothing but a burst of cold air. Maman gasped at the sensation, and he pulled his hands away.

"I'm sorry," he said, trying to swallow back the lump in his own throat. He could weep later, after she left. He did not want her to see his pain. It hurt him enough to see her so upset. He did not want to make it worse for her.

"No, I am sorry," she said, wiping her eyes with her hands. "I should not be sad. Because you are right, I will get to be with him again. I have waited for him for forty long years. I know we do not speak about your father, Lucien. I know he hurt too much at my passing to be able to be the father you needed him to be."

"He needed you, and you were gone," Lucien said understandingly. It took him a long time to come to terms with that, the fact that his father was a cold bastard because the part of him that possessed any warmth or love had died with Lucien's mother.

"I know," she said. "I wish I could have been there to help you both. But I…I loved him very, very much."

Lucien nodded. "I remember."

Genevieve smiled at that. "Do you? You were so little when I died."

"I remember that we were happy."

"We were," she confirmed. "I wasn't always happy. Life here was difficult for me at times. But you and your father, I loved you both with all my heart. Anything I suffered, it was not because of either of you."

Lucien had thought of his mother quite a lot in his youth. As he got older and especially when he was stationed overseas in a foreign country where he was still learning the language and felt so out of place, he thought of how hard it must have been for Genevieve Etienne to travel around the world with a country doctor in Australia to build a life with him there. At least Lucien had the comfort of the army. Genevieve had no one.

She sighed, standing up. "I think I will go down and say goodnight to your father. I don't know if he can feel me there the way he used to, but I want to tell him that I'm waiting for him."

"You still go to him? After all this time?" Lucien asked. He knew that Genevieve visited her loved ones. She had told him that she had visited him many times, particularly when he was young and in school, that she would wait until he was almost asleep and whisper her love for him. Thinking back, he recalled thinking about his mother at night in his dormitory without really meaning to. That had been her presence. And he knew that she said goodnight to her husband as well. Did he get the same sensation that Lucien had experienced? Or was it different being visited by his wife, the woman he never stopped loving to the point of anguish? Lucien supposed he would never know.

Genevieve had that serene smile on her face again as she went to the door, still closed from where she'd led Mrs. Beazley out. "I have so little to comfort me. I have you, here, and I have the moments where I get to see my Thomas. I will go to him every night until he is with me again."

"Do they all do that?"

"I do not know. I keep to myself, as I tried to do when I was living here. But I daresay many others were taken from their loved ones so early. I have particular interest in remaining with you both as much as I can."

And with that, Genevieve blew a kiss to her son, as she did each time she left him, and she turned to walk right through the closed door.

Lucien considered trying to follow her, but he knew better. He had spent fifteen long years trying and failing. He knew better than to try again. Particularly now.

His father was dying. Soon, in fact. And Lucien knew that things would change after that. The house would be left to Thomas's sister, his only living relative. So far as he knew, at least. And then Aunt Dorothy would either live in it and do what she wanted, or else she would sell the house to some stranger. Lucien had no idea what would happen to him then.

Regardless of what happened to the house, Lucien knew that when his father died, he would be alone. Maman would want to be with him, to help ease him into death, to make up for the years they had suffered apart. And she would not come to visit Lucien anymore. Not for a long time, at least. Dad would need all her attention. And really, Lucien did not begrudge that in the slightest. He knew how his parents loved each other, and he remembered the unbearable pain that her death had brought to Lucien and Thomas both. Lucien knew that if he could be reunited with his wife, he would be single-minded about Mei Lin for quite some time. But Lucien knew by now that he would never get to see his wife or his child ever again. He did not know if they were alive or dead. He had no way of ever knowing.

Lucien rested his head on the back of the sofa, sighing sadly. He tried not to let himself fixate on the tragedy of his circumstance if he could help it. It did him absolutely no good, and there was nothing he could do about it.

He tried to think about something else instead of the fact that Maman was the only company he'd ever had these last fifteen years and he had no idea what he would do when she left.

Although, that Mrs. Beazley had appeared in the studio tonight. So far as Lucien knew, she was the first person to open that door in forty years, since Dad closed up the studio to hide away painful memories of Genevieve. Mrs. Beazley had been living and working in the house for a number of years, so far as Lucien understood. Why had she explored the studio now? And why did Maman say she was important? Did she expect this housekeeper to learn of their secrets? What good would that do, assuming she even believed what she saw and what she was told?

At least, Lucien reasoned, it might be some company for him. She had seemed frightened when she saw Lucien and Genevieve sitting there, and Lucien could not blame her. But perhaps she was smart and interesting and kind. Perhaps she might come back and talk to him sometime. That might be nice.

Well, it was something, at least. Lucien had nothing else.