“The Doom Statues” — Chapter 53

“It’s funny, but I think I actually remember the last words I heard him say,” Emily recalls, as the six of them, with every overhead light and lamp on in the room, begin gently tossing it. “He was telling that mom and those kids at his last workshop, blue is actually not a very common color in nature. Somehow it came up. Then he had mentioned tulips, that they grew in every color except that.”

“Should we be doing? This a crime scene, no?” Rafael asks the group.

“Pssh. Well, yeah, maybe in theory,” Jeremy tells him. “But the police obviously didn’t give a fuck. I think they basically flipped on his lights and said, yep, this was his studio, and kept on moving.”

Emily mostly just drifts around, hands clasped behind her back and inspecting Tom’s paintings. This hardwood floor and soft yellow light of the lamps provide the room with palpable warmth, she feels, and it was easy to see why he fell in love with working here. Just as she’s all but certain that, while they may never know why he left, the answer, if one exists, is bound to be in this room. That it must have been…