The Key He Left Behind

Élise didn't light the candle that night. For the first time in ten years, she was afraid of what it might call across the street.

She sat in the dark, hands folded on the kitchen table, watching the apartment where Marc's face moved behind uncurtained windows. He made coffee. He checked his phone. He did things ghosts shouldn't do.

Madame Renard arrived without knocking. She carried a bottle of wine and the look of a woman who'd seen everything before.

"You saw him," Élise whispered.

"I saw him ten years ago. The night of the fire." Madame Renard set down two glasses. "A man slipped out of the back courtyard, untouched. Not a single ember on his coat. I told the police. They said grief makes people see things."

"He's real," Élise said.

"Yes." Madame Renard's voice went soft, terrible. "The question is what he wants. Or what he wants you to remember."

The knock came at nine.

Élise opened the door without checking the peephole because grief had taught her — nobody who mattered was ever coming.

He stood in the hallway, rain on his shoulders, wearing a coat she would have recognized anywhere if she hadn't buried it with Marc's name on the tag.

"You left your candle unlit," he said. His voice was Marc's voice. The low