He shook his shaggy hair from his eyes and looked down at me. His mouth twitched impatiently. “What?” I asked after a few beats of silence. “What do you want?” There was no sound, but his chest rose and fell in a silent harrumph. He lifted one hand from my shoulder and ran his thumb slowly along the length of my jaw. It made my skin crawl. He turned his back to me and looked out at the expanse of steps before us. I watched with him, not because I wanted to see what he was seeing, but because I had no choice but to stare straight ahead. He pointed to something off in the distance, reaching a long finger toward the top of the staircase. Then he quickly swiped it down in a straight line, as though his finger were the edge of a blade. For a moment, the blue and gray of the stairs and the sky stood still. Then all at once the image split into two halves, opening like a curtain to reveal a perfect square of gaping, horrible blackness.
