She took a step back, her eyes wide. “Danny, don’t say such a thing!”
He glared at her, feeling not like Danny Hart, but someone else using his voice. “Matthias was selfish for keeping Evaline. You were selfish when you chose to go to Chelmsford. And I was selfish, too, wanting something I couldn’t have. But I’m doing what I can to save Enfield and Maldon. In order to save Colton and Dad. Don’t compare me to Matthias, Mum. Don’t blame me for something I haven’t done.”
Leila looked away. Danny moved to the stove, angrily preparing another pot of tea. It came as naturally as breathing.
“It isn’t his fault.”
They both turned at the sound of Evaline’s voice. The spirit stood in the kitchen doorway.
Leila opened her mouth, but Danny rushed to speak first; he couldn’t trust his mother not to drive Evaline from their house. “How’s Colton?”
“Worse, I’m afraid. If we find Matthias I can ask what he’s done with the cog, but I don’t think he would tell me. Not after—”
“Why did you leave?”
Evaline turned from Danny to his mother. Leila was breathing hard through her nose, her fists clenched.
The clock spirit dropped her eyes. “It’s difficult to explain.”
“Difficult to explain? There’s nothing to explain. The town’s suffered—we’ve suffered—because of you. You have to go back. You have to free my husband!”
Danny stepped between them. “Mum, wait. She didn’t know that the town would Stop, and Matthias told her it had been fixed. Blame him, not her.”
“She’s still responsible for her actions. Leaving … leaving Christopher there …” She almost gave in to tears, but collected herself at the last moment. “She’s the most selfish of us all.”
“If Matthias had just told her—”
“No,” Evaline interrupted. “No, she’s right. This is my mistake to fix.” She closed her eyes, regaining control of herself, and then returned her gaze to Leila. “I’m sorry,” she said, “for Stopping the town and for preventing your husband from coming home. If I had known, I would never have left. I only had eyes for Matthias, and I see now that I was foolish. Perhaps clock spirits are not quite so different from humans after all.”
Danny touched his mother’s arm. “It’s not like we could help it. You said so yourself: wouldn’t you do anything for the one you love?”
Leila looked at him. Her eyes were vague and somber, but gradually something shifted, a curtain pulled back. He caught her gaze flickering almost imperceptibly to the ceiling. Toward his room.
After a moment, she turned away, crossing her arms low over her chest.
“Just as long as you return to Maldon.”
“I will,” Evaline said softly.
Leila slumped down into a chair. Danny glanced at Evaline.
“Can you give us a moment?”
The spirit nodded. She returned to his bedroom, her step so light that Danny didn’t even hear her on the stairs that normally creaked under his and his mother’s weight.
“It all seems so impossible,” Leila whispered. “I’ve spent three years trying to convince myself I’d never see him again. Now he’s right within my reach, but I still can’t touch him.”
Danny knelt before his mother. “I haven’t done a very good job filling in for Dad, but I promise we’ll get him back.”
She sniffed and dabbed at one eye with her sleeve. “What’s this nonsense? Your father would be proud, seeing you take charge like this. You sounded like him just then.”
Unable to meet her eyes, he stared at her shoulder instead. “It’s my fault he went. My fault he’s gone.”
Leila grew very still. When he finally mustered the courage to look up, her tears had finally escaped.
“Why did I ever say that to you?” she asked, her voice thick. “I couldn’t think. I couldn’t do anything.” She exhaled shakily. “Couldn’t be the mother you needed.”
She reached for him, hesitant, unsure if he’d let her touch him. But he didn’t move, so she swept his hair back, just as she’d done when he was little. Tears continued to fall from her lower lashes. “I’m so sorry, Danny.”
He kept blinking, his vision fuzzy. “You were right. It was my fault.”
“No,” she whispered. “It’s not your fault, Danny. Your father was going to go to Maldon either way. Even if you’d told him not to go, it wouldn’t have changed his mind.”
He expected some relief—released pressure like a soap bubble popping—but all the conversation brought him was a weight heavier than before. The weight of three silent years. The weight of an empty house.
“Please forgive me,” she murmured, her fingers trembling against his face. “Please.”
The words were already waiting on his tongue. “I do, Mum. I forgive you.”
The weight eased. Perhaps not entirely, but enough.
They both took a deep breath. Not an ending. Not fully a beginning. But something.
The kitchen door opened. Danny stood at the frightened look on Evaline’s face.
“He’s getting worse,” she said. “He’s … fading.”