Chapter 2 - THE PORCH LIGHT The drive to the edge of town took twenty minutes. For nineteen of them, I stared at the green metal lunchbox resting on my knees.
Arthur pulled the car to a stop at the end of a cracked driveway. The streetlights flickered here. The neighborhood was quiet, the kind of quiet that meant people were inside worrying about tomorrow.
"She leaves the porch light on," Arthur said quietly, putting the car in park. "Every Friday. For twenty years."
I looked at the house. It was small, weathered, but immaculately kept. The garden was neat. But the wooden steps leading to the front door were new. The raw pine stood out against the faded white paint of the porch.
My father’s work.
I stepped out of the car into the cool night air. My chest tightened with every step I took up that walkway. I had promised to fix those stairs when I was seventeen, standing at a funeral, unable to look a grieving mother in the eye.
I raised my hand to knock, but the door opened before my knuckles touched the wood.
Mrs. Bennett stood there. Her hair was entirely silver now, her shoulders a little more stooped, but her eyes—warm, sharp, and deeply kind—were exactly as I remembered them.
She didn't look surprised. She looked down at the green lunchbox in my hand, and then up at my face.
"He said you’d come when you were ready," she said, her voice steady.
"I’m late, Mrs. Bennett."
"Come inside, Luca. The tea is already hot."
The inside of the house smelled like cinnamon and old paper. It was a home frozen in time, yet clearly lived in. On the mantel, a framed photograph of Peter stood proudly. My heart hammered against my ribs. I hadn't seen Peter's face in nearly two decades.
"Your father sat in that chair," she pointed to a worn leather recliner in the corner. "Every Friday at 5:30. He’d eat his half of the sandwich, and we’d talk."
"What did you talk about?" I asked, my voice barely a whisper.
"You," she said simply. "He told me about your promotions. Your new offices. He clipped every article from the paper. He was so proud of you, Luca."
The guilt was a physical weight, pressing down on my lungs. "He never told me. He made it seem like he despised my life. My money."
"He didn't despise your money," Mrs. Bennett said, pouring a cup of tea. "He was afraid of what the money was making you forget."
She pushed a small plate toward me. "He was also afraid you wouldn't understand why he was spending so much time here. Why he needed to."
"Because I didn't fix the steps," I said bitterly.
"No, Luca." Mrs. Bennett stopped pouring. She looked out the kitchen window, into the dark backyard. "Because of what he was building back there."
I stood up, walking toward the window. Through the glass, illuminated by a solitary floodlight, I saw the silhouette of a massive, half-finished wooden structure in the branches of the old oak tree.
"A treehouse?" I asked, confused. "Why was my father building a treehouse?"
Before Mrs. Bennett could answer, the kitchen door creaked open.
Footsteps patted against the linoleum.
I turned around. Standing in the doorway was a little boy, no older than six. He had unruly dark hair and rubbed his eyes sleepily.
But it was what was hanging loosely around the boy's tiny wrist that made my blood run cold.
It was a heavy, silver chronograph watch.
May you like
The watch I had given Peter for his twenty-first birthday. The watch he had been wearing the night of the fire.
The boy looked up at me. "Are you the man who's going to finish my grandpa's treehouse?"
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