Part 5: Why Didn’t You Tell Me?
The next Saturday came cold and still. The kind of morning where frost clings to the inside of the windows and the world moves slow, as if afraid to wake the dead.
Isaac Merrow sat at the kitchen table, staring at a box he’d pulled from the attic. A plain wooden thing, edges dulled with time. On the lid, his father had carved a simple name decades ago: “Clarice.”
He hesitated. Then opened it.
Inside were letters. Drawings. Ribbons. A broken watch. And photos—
Dozens of them. Of his mother. Of her with Basil as a puppy. Of Ellis before his back began to bend and his eyes dulled into quiet.
But what made Isaac stop cold was a small envelope, worn at the folds.
To Basil — in case I can’t stay.
Isaac opened it slowly.
The paper was yellowed, the handwriting neat and delicate. His mother’s.
“You are the last thing I can give him.
Stay with him until he remembers how to love again.
Guard his silence. And if he grows distant—don’t leave.
He will need you more than he knows.
Tell him I never stopped watching.”
Isaac folded it back carefully. His throat burned.
He looked down at the collar now resting on the table beside his elbow, the brass tag cool under his fingers. He suddenly felt like the last page of a story he’d only just started reading.
Outside, Ellis worked in the garage. The sounds of sanding and scraping echoed softly from the open door. The beginnings of a bench sat in the middle — planks laid out, legs clamped, tools lined like soldiers waiting for a call.
Isaac stepped in and leaned against the frame.
“Where’d you learn to carve?” he asked.
Ellis didn’t stop sanding. “My father,” he said. “Taught me when I was about your age. Out behind his shed in Nebraska.”
“Did you keep any of his work?”
Ellis looked up, eyes distant. “No. He burned most of it before he passed. Said it wasn’t worth keeping.”
“That’s not true,” Isaac said. “It’s always worth keeping.”
Ellis paused. The sandpaper went still.
“You found her box,” he said quietly.
Isaac nodded. “Yeah.”
He waited, thinking maybe Ellis would scold him. But he didn’t.
“I used to read that letter aloud to Basil,” Ellis said. “On nights I couldn’t sleep.”
Isaac sat down beside the workbench. “Why didn’t you tell me she wrote to him? Or that you still talked to him like that?”
Ellis shrugged. “You were so young when she died. I thought I had to protect you from everything, even from how much I missed her.”
“You didn’t,” Isaac said. “I could’ve handled it. Maybe not then, but… I could now.”
Ellis looked at him then — really looked — and saw the change. The man forming in the boy. The pain softening into understanding.
“I guess I didn’t know how to talk about her without falling apart,” Ellis said. “And I didn’t want to fall apart in front of you.”
Isaac swallowed hard.
“Maybe we fall apart together,” he said. “And build something new from it.”
They spent the rest of the day working on the bench. The wood wasn’t perfect. Some pieces were warped from the cold, and one leg had to be redone after Isaac mismeasured.
But Ellis didn’t mind. He worked slowly, letting the rhythm of it do the talking.
By sundown, they had it standing upright — a bit crooked, a bit humble, but solid.
That night, Ellis handed Isaac a carving knife.
“Pick your side,” he said.
Isaac chose the right armrest. Began slowly scratching in a name.
BASIL
Underneath it, he etched:
“He stayed.”
On the left side, Ellis carved a single word.
CLARICE
And in the middle slat, where the back met the seat, he inscribed:
“Merrow.”
No title. No grand phrase. Just the name. Enough for anyone who came to sit and wonder.
The next morning, they carried the bench out to the backyard. Placed it gently beneath the old spruce tree, just beside the small mound of earth where Basil slept.
The sun hadn’t fully risen yet. The light came soft, pale gold, the way mornings sometimes feel when grief begins to fade into memory.
Isaac sat first.
“It’s colder than I thought it’d be,” he muttered.
Ellis laughed softly. “That’s how real benches are. They don’t try to keep you comfortable. They just give you somewhere to be.”
They sat in silence for a while. Birds passed overhead. A single squirrel scampered along the fence line. The house behind them creaked with age.
Then Isaac spoke.
“You ever think she knew?” he asked. “That Basil would be the one to pull us back together?”
Ellis nodded slowly. “I think she saw a lot more than we ever gave her credit for.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out the old brass tag again.
“I used to rub this between my fingers whenever I didn’t know what to do,” he said. “It was like… she left me something solid to hold on to.”
He handed it to Isaac.
“Now it’s your turn.”
Isaac turned the tag over in his hand. Read the familiar words again:
“If found, return to Merrow. He waits.”
He slipped it into his coat pocket without a word. It felt heavier than it looked. And somehow, it no longer felt like it belonged to just the dog.
That night, Isaac couldn’t sleep.
He walked the halls of the school, flashlight in hand. Not because he had to. But because he wanted to understand.
He reached the west wing. The place it happened.
He stood in the exact spot where Basil had fallen.
Then, slowly, he knelt down, placed his hand flat against the tile, and whispered, “Thank you.”
He didn’t expect an answer.
But in the distance — somewhere in the quiet bowels of the school — a heating vent rattled gently, and the sound that followed was soft, warm, and familiar.
Like a tail thumping, one last time.