He heard her knocking, knocking, and then finally pounding but he refused to answer, giving in only when he heard the pathetic weeping from beneath the door.

He walked through the apartment, past the rows of equipment, the empty cot, the folding chairs for family members, the vials and syringes he’d managed to keep after the lawyers and courts were done with him, and flung open the door to confront the girl who’d recognized him and then trailed him home from the sidewalk outside the grocery store.

Leave me, I cannot help you, he yelled at her, her skeletal face shrinking from his rage, her hands fluttering in defense, bat-like, her whole body beseeching, begging him to stop her pain but he would only glare until at last she dropped her eyes and murmured to the floor please, you must help me.

My time of helping is done, he said, and slamming the door on her need, went back to sit at his place by the window, staring down at the alleyway until he saw her shuffling body pulling away, yet even as she turned the corner he yelled through the broken glass, stop, I’ll help you, but it was too late, too late for them both, and closing the blind he sighed.

He sat awake far in to the night, thinking about his lost wife, his daughter, and knew the girl would come back.

At the end, they always came to him.

Included in the 6S Mysterious Dr. Ramsey http://www.amazon.com/6S-The-Mysterious-Dr-Ramsey/dp/1453661239