Twenty

The police were quite interested in Fulsom. They had a lot of stray murders that needed explaining. One lunatic's confession could clear up a lot of old paperwork. Argus was just glad it was finally over, at least until more depositions were taken and there was a trial and all of that stuff. He'd been hoping to get back to his old life, but that old life was gone. He realized that people had risked their own lives, had come to his rescue and saved him.

Something had changed inside him as well. He could laugh. He could make people laugh. He could say what he thought, and sometimes they'd listen. It wasn't so hard. In the mornings he chased after Karly and Kansas, and sometimes he caught them. He hung out in the kitchen at home in the evenings. He even helped cook and clean up. He thought about getting back into design work.

He called up his brother and invited him over. Alex was happy to see him. They joked about Fulsom and about that old story, about the weird thing from another dimension or whatever it was there in Snapdragon Alley. Alex admitted he'd never believed it. He hadn't actually seen it himself. It was Uncle Charlie who said it, and Sapphire who thought it, and now they were both out of their lives. Charlie had vanished forever, and Sapphire was somewhere in the world telling stories.