Vesper

The Boy

A mother in a garden tells her daughter about the boy she loved at seventeen. She has never told anyone.

The Lamplighter’s Daughter

Every night at dusk, she walks the route.

The Consultation

Her job is to sell people a beautiful dream they never have to wake up from. She's signed three hundred and forty-eight — and kept count of how many are still alive.

The Date

She has a date tonight. She's been counting down for days. The outfit ties at the back.

The Floor

Every Thursday at 2PM, a dying ex-soldier teaches the Fixer in a concrete tunnel beneath the city. His student is late. His kettle is slow. His standards are not negotiable.

The Shepherd

She trims their nails. She checks their skin. She knows when they're dying before the machines do.

The Reckoning

A smuggler bleeds out in a tunnel beneath the city. He has one phone call left.

The Box

The Fixer must carry one fragile cake across Vesper by dusk. What could go wrong.

The Piano Teacher

An elderly piano teacher gives weekly lessons to a girl whose mother is running out of reasons to stay.

The Small One

A creature in the tunnels finds a rat with a broken leg. She's never had anyone to lose before.

The Long Way Home

Twelve-year-old Linh takes the long way home from school and finds something in an alley that should not exist. By nightfall, the people hunting it are in her neighborhood.

Visiting Hours

Once a week, he comes home for an hour. She moved the lamp.

The Technician

A Bliss technician comes to fix her Halo. She hadn't seen him in thirteen years.

The Garden Party

Every September, Constance Harwick sets her garden table for twenty-six. Six chairs sit empty. No one says the name of the company that emptied them.

Three Days

The Fixer disappeared for three days. This is what he was doing.

The Boat

Dimitri Andreou returns to Driftwood with a five-day ticket back to Hamburg and a plan to bury his father and leave. The tunnels, his father's unfinished business, and a woman one floor down have other plans.

The Christening

Vivian Ashworth has prepared every detail of her granddaughter's christening. The afternoon will not go the way she's planned.

The Visit

Her mother dances in a garden that doesn't exist. Her daughter watches through the glass.

The Orientation

The Buddhist

A young man walks into his old priest's church after five years. His knuckles are split.