Author’s Note: Nick’s theory makes a certain sort of sense.

“I’ve got it figured out. I know why Grandpa left you the stuff in the barn.”

“You do, do you? Enlighten me,” Carson said, wiping a rag across his forehead. He didn’t really care why his grandfather had done it, not anymore. Nick’s presence would have been a whole more useful if he’d done something to help with the giant mess that Carson had been dealing with for the past four hours. He didn’t want to look at any longer, but he had to be back in the city tomorrow, so the more he got done now, the better.

He at least wanted to clear a path to the locked door. If all he managed to do today was get that open, that was enough for him. He wanted to make sure he saw that before anyone had a chance to mess with what might be in there.

That door could hold the key to answers he’d wanted all his life. It could be hiding his father’s remains. At this point, Carson had no way of knowing what was in there, but at the same time, he didn’t plan on quitting before he found out.

And behind door number one… nothing, he thought, but he shook it off and looked over at his brother. With his light hair and bright blue eyes, Nick had the strongest resemblance to their mother, whereas Larry looked like a younger version of Grandpa and Carson got cursed—he was a near replica of the man everyone hated.

Maybe that was why he was so obsessed with this idea of his father being dead. Otherwise, the man he kept seeing out here was… himself. He’d never believed in visions, had no intention of starting, but he did think maybe he was going to crack under the pressure again. The first time had been a few weeks before the valedictorian speech he never made, and this could be similar. He was up for promotion, after all, and that meant more hours, more responsibility, more room for failure.

“We should just have named you after someone who went into space. That’s all you ever do.”

“Hey, I told you to enlighten me. It’s not my fault you overplayed the dramatic pause and ruined everything. I got bored. So sue me.”

“That would be Larry.”

“No, that would be Larry’s ex. She was the lawyer.”

“Must you do that?”

“Bad habit, I guess. Come on, Nick. I’m tired. I don’t want to do this all day. I’ve got a bit left to go before I get to that door, and that’s where I’m quitting. I just want to get that door open.”

“Exactly.”

Carson reached for a contorted piece of metal, not sure what it had ever been a part of, pointing it at his brother. “Either tell me or go, but if you don’t spit it out soon, something like this just might connect with the side of your head because this is getting ridiculous.”

“Fine, fine. Look, Grandpa gave you everything out here so that you’d have to go through every nook and cranny of this place, so that you’d have to see everything for what it is, but more importantly, for what it isn’t. It’s not evidence. It’s junk. Even if you get that door open, you’re not going to find a body. You’re not going to find a murder. Maybe this will finally allow you to put all those old nightmares behind you so that you can move on. You’ll get to be normal—well, for you that might be too much to ask—”

Carson lifted the scrap, giving it a swing that missed his brother, not that he’d meant to hit him. He didn’t want to hurt Nick, not really. He was just tired and frustrated, and he didn’t think anyone did well being teased when they were in a mood like this.

“All right, truce, you two. I can’t believe I have to play peacemaker again,” Larry called as he walked up to them. He yanked the metal from Carson’s hand, and Carson glared at him. “Don’t. You’re too wound up to argue.”

“Nick already told you his theory, didn’t he?”

“Of course.”

“So you think that’s why Grandpa did it, too, don’t you?”

“Maybe.”

Carson shrugged. He picked up the old lopper and carried it over to the door. He studied the old lock for a moment, not sure if a moment like this needed some kind of… ceremony. He could just put the blade on and see if it was sharp enough to do any damage. Somehow he felt like he was on the verge of some big discovery—and yet this could be one of those moments where the vault was empty and he got nothing but humiliation for the rest of his life. Since he’d done that enough already with two older brothers, he figured it wasn’t worth the risk.

“You don’t have to do that tonight.”

“Yeah, I do.”

“You sure you don’t want to sleep on it? You’ve got no idea what’s in there, after all, so…”

Carson shook his head. “No, it’s past time I do. If Nick’s right, and this is going to get me past all those old questions and nightmares and help me let go of all those images in my head, that’s what I have to do. Here goes nothing.”

He put the blade to the padlock, forcing it shut over the thinnest part of the metal, and it gave, cutting through. The old lock fell into the dirt, and Carson stared at it before setting down the shears. He pried the bar up, moving it clear and then tugged on the handle, pulling the door toward him.

After so many years of disuse, it didn’t move fast, not until an extra yank gave it a sudden momentum that knocked him on the ground. He heard his brothers laughing, but he forced himself to ignore it.

Not that it was hard to do. All he could do was stare at the gaping darkness in the doorway before him.

Author’s Note: It may be that I might have to commission my friend who does western art to do a painting of the type of barn I had in mind when I started this story. I can picture it, but a search through my photographs of the old family farm and the ones that came up on google didn’t quite match what I had in mind. If I were to dig up the last barn I drew, it would be laughable at best.

We’ll see. Having that picture might not be necessary. It depends on how this story continues to develop.

“Water?”

“Thanks, Carrie,” Carson said, accepting the glass from his sister-in-law. She gave him a smile, pushing back some of her hair, looking more like she’d been the one sorting through the barn than he did. Then again, he hadn’t made a lot of progress, spending more of his time standing out here studying it like he expected inspiration to hit him so that he’d understand what his grandfather was doing by leaving him all of this.

If his grandfather had been behind his father’s death—if his father was even dead—then maybe this was his backward way of confessing, but why wouldn’t he just have put that in the will? In a letter for them to read after he was gone?

By the way, I’m dying so now I can admit that I killed him, and I’m not sorry. I did it for my daughter and grandsons, and I’d do it again. I’m only admitting it now because by the time anyone reads this, I’ll be dead.

“Carson?”

“Sorry. Daydreaming again. Bad habit of mine.”

“I don’t think daydreaming is the right word for what you’ve been doing,” she told him, folding her arms over her chest. She shook her head. “That didn’t look like any kind of ‘dream’ to me, more like a nightmare, and it always does when your mind starts wandering. What makes you so quick to go to the darkness, anyway?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe I’m a born pessimist. Why not? My father took off when I was born, so that’s not a very auspicious way to start life, now is it?”

“I suppose not, but you don’t have to let it rule your life, either. Plenty of people do just fine with only one parent, and your grandfather more than made up for your father taking off. Larry and Nick, they’re angry about the whole thing, but you, you turn it into something frightening. A murder.”

“I don’t know that it had to be murder. I know it’s crazy. I know they did everything to prove that I never saw what I thought I saw. Maybe it’s just my mind’s way of coping with the fact that he’s not a part of my life. I mean, he’s been as good as dead for almost thirty years. Picturing him that way isn’t that unreasonable.” Carson took another sip of the water and then turned it around in the glass, feeling like he was stalling, but he didn’t know why he’d do that. This wasn’t a conversation he wanted to have, and he didn’t need Nick’s wife mothering him, either. He would get back to work in a minute. “It’s just being out here again. It’s been a long time since I thought about it—too much work, never the time to spare to drive out all this way—and so I haven’t been here in almost a year. Hadn’t seen Grandpa in that long, either, and now he’s gone. Grief works in strange ways.”

Carrie looked at him. “You work in strange ways, Carson.”

He grunted, setting down the water and picking up the pitchfork. He had to deal with the hay first—he was letting his uncle keep anything that was worth using—and then he could start uncovering the stuff he would need to make a decision about. The worst part would be behind the doors in the back, a closet of sorts that he didn’t think had been opened in his entire lifetime. “Anyone find the keys yet?”

“No.”

“Probably have to break the lock.”

“Your uncle won’t like that.”

“So he won’t like it. I know he’s pissed about me getting everything in the barn. It was the lawyer who said I got any of the animals in here, not me, and I already told him I’d give them to him since they belong on the farm. I wouldn’t have a place for them, and I don’t have time to care for him. I told him he could have the hay, too. Didn’t make him any happier.”

It almost made Carson wonder if his uncle had secrets to hide out here, if that was why he was so upset about Carson getting all this, but he was tired of his own paranoia. He had no reason to believe that anything had happened out here. He did not need to make this situation worse by voicing any of his suspicions or even by thinking too much about them. He’d done enough to alienate his family already.

“You don’t have to do this all today, you know.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“You’re going to try and do it anyway, aren’t you?”

“Yeah, I am.”