“No one who’s stayed.”

  “You mean no one who hasn’t ended up in a story?”

  “Not everyone ends up in stories.”

  He looked concerned. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, some people fade,” she said matter-of-factly.

  “They fade?”

  “Usually the ones who fade start out blurry. They just never take shape, and then they—” She waved her hand. “—fade away.”

  James looked concerned. “Has anyone with a name faded?”

  “Yeah. Sometimes.”

  “That’s awful.”

  “Oh.” Anna should be more thoughtful. None of this was matter-of-fact for him. And he was full of feelings. His personality must be a mile deep. “James, that’s not going to happen to you. You burst into life fully formed. That’s such a good sign.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Oh yeah. You’re like a tool built for a very specific job. I really think you’ll go in as soon as she has a chance to sit down.”

  He tipped his head into his hand and scratched his head. “I shouldn’t let you comfort me like this. It’s very selfish.”

  “I don’t mind,” she said. “I’m just being honest.”

  “Honest,” he said. “Likable. Sympathetic.”

  “Stop,” she said, smiling. “Are you hungry?”

  “Is there food here?”

  “So much food,” she said, “everywhere you turn. There’s always a cake on my kitchen counter.”

  “What kind?”

  “Lemon with coconut frosting. Sometimes pineapple upside-down cake.”

  “And we can eat it?”

  “Yes.” Anna stood up, scooping Peaches out of her lap and onto the porch.

  The cake was delicious. The plates and silverware were antiques.

  Anna’s parents came home after a while. They were blurry; she could tell it made James nervous. She took him back out to the porch swing.

  “Why do you think you still live at home?” he asked her.

  “I don’t think she’s gotten around to figuring that out. This house is full of narrative inconsistencies. Ideas dropped on top of older ideas. It’s a mess.”

  “I kind of like it,” James said. The sun was setting over the fields. “Why does the sun set?”

  “I don’t know,” Anna said. “To keep us sane?”

  He laughed. “I feel tired. Is that crazy?”

  “No. I think it’s another good sign. Not all of us sleep.”

  “Do you sleep?”

  “Yes. Sometimes I even dream.”

  James giggled. Like that was too much.

  “You could stay here,” Anna said, too quickly. Too hopeful.

  He glanced at her. “Do you have room?”

  Theoretically, she thought. “Yeah,” she said.

  They watched the sun set. James wanted to know more about main characters. Anna described every one that she could remember.

  “They seem like a troubled bunch,” he said. “Damaged.”

  “I guess so,” she agreed. “But not irreparably.”

  “I’ll take your word on it—but I don’t think I’m a main character. I feel mostly fine.”

  “The main thing about main characters,” Anna said, “is their definition. The light hits them differently. Like … they have blue veins in their arms and dry skin on their knees. They have a distinct way of holding their shoulders. They have nervous tics and a hundred smiles. They stand out from a mile away.”

  James was listening, watching.

  “You’re wearing brushed twill trousers, James. And even your freckles are in focus. Someone took a lot of care with you.”

  “I shouldn’t let you comfort me,” he whispered.

  “I’m just being honest. Come on, I’ll show you your room.”

  There’d always been a door between Anna’s bedroom and the bathroom. It never opened. Tonight she tried it anyway.

  It opened.

  Into a hazy void.

  Anna quickly pulled the door shut. “Let me try that again.”

  She closed her eyes and pictured a room. What kind of room would James like? Something simple. Reassuring. She pictured a bed like hers, but with a green wool blanket. With clean white sheets and three feather pillows. With lace curtains. And a window cracked to let in the breeze. She added a pitcher of water and a basin. Even though that seemed antiquated. She imagined it all. Then she opened her eyes and smiled up at him. She opened the door into the room.

  “Anna …” James whispered. “Did you do this?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Can everyone do this?”

  “No,” she said softly.

  “How …”

  “I’ve been here so long,” she said, “I think I might be merging with the equipment.”

  James huffed out a laugh. Like he was overwhelmed and also a little spooked. “Is it safe?”

  “I can’t hurt or hide you,” she said. “And I wouldn’t. It’s safe. It’s all the same place. I promise.”

  “Okay.” He looked down at her. “I believe you. Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome … There’ll be breakfast in the morning. Homemade biscuits.”

  “I’ll see you then. Good night, Anna.”

  “Good night, James.”

  Anna lay in her bed, listening to the wind and feeling … light. Feeling exhilarated. She’d never had anyone stay the night before. She hadn’t met many people like James. People who were her age. People who could talk the way he could talk. Who could sleep. And eat cake. And got scared in a way they could articulate.

  She thought about his strawberry-blond hair and his pale blue eyes.

  She was waiting for him when he came downstairs the next morning wearing the same green pants and cream sweater.

  Anna had changed. She had a closet full of dresses—and matching shoes if she wanted. Even some hats. She really was like Barbie.

  “Looks like the house didn’t eat you,” she said.

  “Good morning,” he said.

  “Good morning. Did you sleep?”

  “Like a baby—and you were right.”

  “About what?”

  “It was different. From my memory of sleeping.”

  She gripped her coffee cup in both hands. “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.” He seemed excited, too. “Like, the texture was different. If I thought about it too hard, the feeling slipped through my fingers. But it was still there.”

  Anna nodded her head. “That’s it exactly. It’s everywhere,” she said. “That feeling. Everything is a little different here. This experience is different.”

  James shook his head. Shaking it off. “It was wild. Can I have some coffee?”

  “Your first cup of coffee,” she said.

  He laughed. “I guess so.”

  They ate breakfast, and she asked if he wanted to meet some of the other people who lived here. That seemed to make him uncomfortable.

  “Maybe if I end up staying,” he said. “But if I’m only going to be here for another day or so …”

  “That makes sense,” Anna said. “Besides, you’ll just make them all jealous.”

  She was glad he’d said no. She wanted him to herself. After breakfast, they took a walk in the wheat fields. James had grown up in a city. This was all new to him. He asked her more questions. About how the world worked. She couldn’t answer all of them, but she could answer better than anyone else here.

  They came back for lunch. Grilled cheese sandwiches. “Does your mom make these?” he asked.

  “No, they’re just part of the house. Vestigial narrative.”

  That amused him. Anna amused him. He was always smiling at her. It was incentive to keep talking.

  After lunch, they sat on the porch again. James told her what he knew about himself. He was a sociologist. He worked at a university. He got excited when he realized they were both from Nebraska.

  “That’s nothing,” she said. “We’re all from Nebraska. It’s like how Stephen King’s characters are all from Maine.”

  “Oh.” He hunched back into the swing, disappointed. “Well. I’m a professor, but I do research, too. I was married once, in my twenties, but it didn’t last. I’m not very good at dating.”

  “You are such a love interest,” she said.

  “Wouldn’t not-being-good-with-girls make me a bad love interest?”

  “Uh. No. Sweet that you think so.”

  James was blushing. “Well. I … mostly deal with my mom and the guy in the office next to mine—I wonder if they’re here?”

  “Can you picture them?”

  “Not really.”

  “Probably not, then. But you might have an office.”

  “My office …” he said. “The whole campus. How would we find it?”

  “You just have to set your mind to it,” Anna said. “If it’s here, we’ll get there.”

  James stood up. He walked off the porch. Anna followed him up the driveway and down a path, onto a university campus. She’d never seen anything so expansive—it took her breath away.

  “James … this is magnificent.”

  “I think she went to school here,” he said. “That makes it easy to conjure, right?”

  The buildings got fuzzy when you got close to them, and they kept changing places. But the building where James worked was solid. The staircase smelled like wood polish. The door to his office was open. He was delighted. “This is it,” he said. “This is mine.”

  “It’s gorgeous,” Anna said. There were papers on his desk with actual writing. There were framed photos with real people in them.

  James sat in his desk chair and spun around. Anna leaned against his desk. “You’re happy here,” she said.

  “Because it’s mine.”

  “No—you’re happy here. Canonically. You like your job.”

  “Oh.” He looked thoughtful. “I think you’re right. That’s nice, isn’t it?”

  “It is.”

  “I want to show you the vending machines,” he said. “The break room has the best vending machines.”

  She followed him to the break room—the only other door that would open—and he bought her an ice cream bar.

  “Are you happy in your house?” he asked, biting into one of those pre-wrapped cones.

  “I am,” she said, “but I don’t think I’m meant to be.”

  “Explain.”

  “I think I’m meant to feel comfort there, but also fear.”

  “Fear of what?”

  “I don’t know,” Anna said, “and that’s why it’s sort of faded. I don’t think she’s ever thought that part through. The threat.”

  “So you’ve just decided not to be afraid of it?”

  “I guess so.”

  “That’s extraordinary, Anna. I can’t even imagine not feeling what I’m meant to feel.”

  “That’s because you’re new,” she said. “You’re still infused with purpose. And you don’t have contradictory experiences.”

  “I must seem like a baby to you.”

  “You seem mint in box,” she said. “Internally consistent.”

  That made him smile.

  They wandered around campus for a while, but the farther they got from James’s office, the more faded everything was.

  Eventually he asked if they could go back to her porch swing.

  “You don’t want to look for your house?” she asked.

  “I don’t think I’m meant to feel happy in my house,” he said.

  “What do you remember feeling there?”

  He thought for a moment. “Lonely.”

  “Fuck that,” she said. “You can wait at my house.”

  They spent another evening on the porch swing. Anna kept expecting him to disappear. She didn’t know what was taking so long—he was so ready.

  She’d met people over the years who started to disappear as soon as you said hello. People who flashed before your eyes. That’s one reason Anna liked to sit in the park. To see who showed up. To see how long they stayed.

  It used to make her bitter. She used to sit there hating them. Hating her.

  But now … Anna was just curious.

  They found beer in the refrigerator, in her kitchen. Miller beer in clear bottles. Anna had never tried it. There wasn’t a bottle opener, so James knocked the caps off on the porch railing. “These beers are thirty years old,” he said. “Look at the labels.”

  Anna looked. She didn’t know what beer labels looked like these days. She wasn’t sure if she was supposed to be thirty-four years old now. Or thirty years ago. She wasn’t fixed in time, really. It was another thing about her that was undecided.

  “I hope I’m going somewhere with a porch swing,” James said, kicking the swing into motion. “What sort of book are you meant for, do you think?”

  She shrugged.

  “You haven’t had any clues, over all these years?”

  “I don’t think she knows,” Anna said. “I think that’s one of the problems. I think she built me before she knew how to build a story. So I’m more of a daydream than anything else.”

  James nudged her with his elbow. “Don’t say that.” He took a sip of his beer. “You’re too well developed for that.”

  “Well, thank you,” she said. “But … it’s a cheat, I think.” She took a second. She might as well tell him, he’d be gone soon. It would be nice to tell someone. “I’m pretty sure all of this is autobiographical.”

  He shrugged. “Everything is autobiographical, right? Like my campus?”

  Anna pursed her lips. “Mmm. It’s different. There’s borrowing details and settings and traits. And then there’s … Well. Then there’s …” She looked down at her beer. She didn’t really like the taste. She was going to offer it to James when he finished his.

  “There’s you,” he said, watching her.

  She nodded. And then she sighed. And nodded some more.

  “That’s got to be an advantage,” James said softly. “For getting in.”

  “I think it was, at first,” Anna said, earnestly looking up at him. “You know how you shove yourself forward when you’re young? But then, over time, maybe you don’t want to show people all that. Maybe there are things that are more valuable if you keep them to yourself.”

  “You can’t be sure of this,” he said. “You’re just theorizing.”

  “I guess I’ve had plenty of time to tell myself stories.”

  James smiled at her. He looked down at her lap. “You don’t like beer?”

  “This,” she said, holding up the bottle, “is my first beer.”

  He clinked his bottle against hers.

  “And my last,” she said. “You can have it.”

  He smiled and took it. “At least I won’t be leaving you here alone with a drinking problem.”

  “You won’t be leaving me here alone,” she said.

  * * *

  The next day, they took another walk through the fields, and Anna showed James the tree she’d used as a playhouse when she was a little girl. It was more real than his office. You could even see the patterns in the bark.

  * * *

  The next day, James woke up with a last name. MacIsaac. He was giddy about it. So Anna was giddy, too. She called him “Mr. Mac-Isaac.” They celebrated with lemon cake.

  In the middle of his second slice, he said, “I’m not a sociologist anymore. I do something for the government.”

  “She’s working on you,” Anna said. “Right now.”

  They both sat still at Anna’s table, waiting for James to change before their eyes. His sweater was replaced with a white button-down shirt. The top button was undone. She could see the freckles on his chest.

  But he didn’t disappear.

  * * *

  The next day, crazy old Renee got called up. (Or down. In.) Renee had been here for years. She wasn’t even a character. She was just a tank top with an obnoxious laugh. She sounded like a donkey.

  James had never met Renee, but he was devastated by the news.

  “Don’t be jealous,” Anna said. “She’ll probably get sent back.”

  “People get sent back?”

  James went inside and got a himself a beer, then he took a long walk in the fields. He didn’t want Anna to go with him.

  Anna waited for him on the porch swing. She wasn’t sure James would make it back without her.

  He did. Long after dark.

  He walked in slow strides up to the porch. “Hey,” he said.

  “Hey,” Anna said. “I didn’t know if you’d be able to find your way.”

  “The fields disappeared as soon as I couldn’t see the house. But … it was all here again when I came back for it.”

  “I’m glad,” she said.

  “Can I sit with you?”

  “Of course.”

  He dropped down onto the swing, and it rocked for a few seconds.

  “There’s dinner inside if you want it,” she said. “My parents are in there watching TV.”

  “I should be nicer to your parents.”

  “I know they make you nervous.”

  “Still …” He sighed and rubbed his face. “I just want to go so bad.”

  “I know.”

  “It feels so urgent.”

  She nodded.

  “And I don’t even know why! I just feel like I’m supposed to be somewhere else. Like I’m a piece in a larger puzzle, and all I want is to click into place.”

  Anna didn’t say anything. It didn’t seem like she should. She didn’t feel anything urgently. (Except maybe urgently wanting James to stay.)

  It hardly bothered her anymore when other characters were called in. She was so used to it—sometimes she was relieved. They got some unbearable smart-asses around here. Good riddance to them.

  It was a little insulting to think that Crazy Old Renee got the call before Anna, but Anna still wasn’t upset about it.

  “I feel like I have a job,” James said, “and she won’t let me do it. It’s infuriating.”

  “I’m sorry,” Anna said.

  “I don’t work for the government anymore, by the way—I’m writing a book.”

  “What about?”

  “I don’t know.” He sounded glum. “It feels like she’s losing the thread.”

  Anna put her hand on his knee and gave it a reassuring squeeze. “She’s just working on you.”