“Show me what?” I repeat.

“Your paintings. You’ve become so prolific. It’s very impressive.”

She walks out to the hall, leaving me alone with Hilbert. I move closer to him. I want to touch him, to take the covers off him, make sure his arms and hands are intact, but as I take hold of his hand, Shelley comes back carrying a box. She opens the lid. She puts the box on the floor.

“Here, have a look. I’m just about to set them up.”

I release Hilbert’s hand and reach into the box she’s holding. I pull out several canvases. Each is a painting.

“They’re marvelous,” she says.

It’s unmistakable. It is my work.

“There are more,” she says.

There must be thirty or forty paintings in this box. It would take years to paint them all. None are the same. All portraits. Of Pete, Ruth, and Hilbert. They’re incomplete. She doesn’t notice. But I do. A small detail here and there. Unfinished.

I feel like I’ve been drained of blood. I can’t speak. I have nothing to say. I feel deflated. I feel old.

“We’re so proud of you and your work, Penny, and we can’t wait to showcase it tonight at the party. You’re looking tired. It’s your eyes. Let’s get you back to your room for a nap.”

There are so many trees outside this house, so many you could never know them all, but each one is there. Each one counts. I noticed them on my first day, before I saw the inside of the house, before I met the others.

I’m standing beside Hilbert’s bed. He’s awake. We’re not talking. We don’t need to.

I’m holding his hand one more time before I go.

The common room is prepared for a party, an opening. I’m not there, but that doesn’t matter. I can see it perfectly with my eyes closed. All of it. Everything. They’re all there. Balloons, and streamers, and punch. The carpet has been vacuumed, the windows washed. Pete tuning his violin. Ruth is reciting Latin, too, rather than French.

What I’ve done is enough. It’s beautiful only because there’s an end. There are so many things we can just let go. Tant de choses à laisser aller.

I’m in my bed, but I’ll go outside. They don’t know it yet, but they’ll get to go out, too, because of me. It’s a gift. It’s my gift to them. Pete doesn’t have to play anymore. Ruth can put her French dictionary back on the shelf. Hilbert can put down his pencil; he doesn’t need any more blue graph paper.

We do not all blend together. We are not ruined, helpless, a burden. We are not the elderly. We are not old people. Now, still, we’re unique. Distinct. Regardless of what we’ve produced or what happens to our bodies. We each have our own memories and experiences, even if they’ve been lost and forgotten.

They, we, all of us can finally rest.

I’m not in my bed anymore. I’ve already snuck away, but I can still see: Shelley walking down the hall in her high heels, walking until she reaches my room. She enters straightaway, without speaking. My shape, my outline, is there, lying in the bed, under the covers.