Set This House in Order Read Online Free PDF Page A

candid with this stranger.
    â€œBut why shouldn’t I be? You said yourself she’s not dangerous.”
    â€œI said she’s not an ax murderer. That doesn’t mean it’s OK to tell her everything about us.”
    â€œI’m not—”
    â€œSo Horace Rollins is your father?” Julie asked, not realizing she was interrupting.
    The question startled me. “Not my father,” I told her. “Andy Gage’s father. Andy Gage’s step father. He’s no relation to me at all. No relation to Andy Gage either, really.”
    â€œYour real father died?”
    â€œAndy Gage’s father,” I corrected her. “Silas Gage. He drowned.”
    â€œAndy Gage’s father…So when you talk about your father, you don’t mean Silas Gage, and you don’t mean Horace Rollins, you mean another personality. Another ‘soul.’”
    â€œAaron,” I said, nodding. “My father.”
    â€œThe one who called you out of the lake…who created you.”
    â€œRight.”
    â€œAnd when exactly was that?” Julie wanted to know. “That you were called out?”
    I’d been hoping she wouldn’t ask that. Contrary to Adam’s accusation, there were a number of things I’d consciously avoided telling Julie. In most cases these omissions were instinctive, and I couldn’t have explained the reasoning behind them at the time. But I knew perfectly well why I’d been vague about my birthdate: I was embarrassed. Julie had so much life experience, and I had so little, I was afraid she wouldn’t want to be friends once she found out how immature I really was. But there was no helping it now.
    â€œA month ago,” I admitted. “I came out of the lake a month ago. I know I probably seem really naive—”
    â€œWait,” Julie said. “You’re a month old?”
    â€œNo,” I said, confused. “I’m twenty-six years old. I was born a month ago.”
    Julie shook her head. “How can both of those things be true?”
    â€œThey just are,” I told her. “What’s the problem?”
    â€œSo it’s your physical body that’s twenty-six?”
    â€œNo, the body is twenty-nine.”
    â€œThen what part of you is twenty-six?”
    â€œMy soul.”
    Julie shook her head again. I went to Adam for help.
    â€œAll right…Adam says, because your body and your soul have always been joined together, they’re basically reflections of each other. They’re like twins.”
    â€œYou mean they look the same? Souls have an appearance?”
    â€œOf course.”
    Julie laughed. “So my soul has crooked teeth?”
    â€œI guess,” I said, glancing at her mouth. “If your body does. And it’s got the same-color eyes, and the same build, and the same voice—and the same age. But for us, it’s not like that. None of us is in the body all the time, so there’s not that same connection. Adam says—”
    â€œWho’s Adam?”
    â€œMy cousin.”
    â€œThis is another soul? Like your father?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œAnd how old is Adam?”
    â€œAdam is fifteen.”
    â€œHas he always been fifteen, or has he gotten older?”
    â€œHe’s gotten a little older,” I said.
    â€œHow much is a little?”
    â€œWell, it’s hard to say exactly. It depends on how much time he’s spent outside. Adam used to steal time in the body, the same as the others; if you added up all that stolen time, plus the time he’s been allowed out since my father took over and started building the house, that would tell you how much older he’s gotten. My father thinks it’s about a year, but Adam won’t say.”
    â€œHe doesn’t want your father to know how much time he really stole,” Julie guessed.
    â€œHe doesn’t want to have to explain what he did with it,” I told