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and covered the peephole. A mosquito drifted past his ear and settled on his extended arm. He slapped at it and waited. A few slow seconds ticked by, and he knocked again.
    Muffled footsteps approached. A dead bolt slid. A chain rattled.
    The door opened, and William Skelton, smoking, leaned against the frame.
    Cyrus took a step backward. The man was wearing jeans and a tight, stained tank top. His face was pale and sickly, but his bare shoulders and arms could have belonged to a thirty-year-old lumberjack, a lumberjack with a taste for morbid tattoos. The man’s skeleton had been crudely needle-etched onto every visible part of his body from the neck down. Scrawled collarbones stood out above a cage of blue ribs. Ink bones marched down his shoulders and arms. Even the backs of his hands and the tops of his bare feet were detailed with every joint and knuckle. Slanted notes and calligraphics filled in the remaining space on his arms and shoulders.
    Cyrus couldn’t help but trace every bit of ink with his eyes. He’d never seen anything like it. Fear was trying to crawl up his spine. He pushed it away. It was ink. Nothing but ink. Looking up into Skelton’s sweating face, Cyrus dug into his pocket and pulled out the ring. “I brought back your keys. You know you can’t smoke in here.”
    William Skelton turned and walked back to Cyrus’s bed.
    “Hey.” Jingling the keys, Cyrus stepped into the doorway. His room had been destroyed. His shelves and their collections had been torn down off one wall and piled on the floor. The wall itself had been ripped open from end to end, revealing a row of hollow cavities and cast-iron plumbing. On the side of the bed, a small but bellied man was sitting with his legs primly crossed. He was wearing a gray suit, and half-moon glasses were perched on the end of his nose. Large sheets of yellowing paper were mounded around him.
    “What?” Cyrus scanned the carnage of his room, his life. “You trashed my room.” Fear was gone. He could feel his pulse in his fingertips as his mind scrambled for some kind of explanation. “You know what?” He kicked a shard of drywall at Skelton’s legs. “I’m keeping your keys, old man. They’re going to disappear. All of them.”
    The small, fat man clicked his tongue and cocked his head. “This is the boy?” he asked Skelton. “This is the best you could do?”
    William Skelton nodded and pulled at his cigarette. He had chewed the end almost flat.
    Cyrus glared at the man in the suit. “Who are you? Did you rip into my wall?”
    Peering over his glasses, the little man examined Cyrus’s shorts, his shirt, and finally his face.
    “I was getting some clean clothes,” Cyrus said. “It’s been a long day. Why did you wreck my room?”
    “You’re sure about this, Billy?” the small man asked.
    “About what?” Cyrus asked. The room was chilly with air-conditioning, but William Skelton wiped sweat from his forehead onto the back of his tattooed arm.
    “Kid,” he said quietly. “How do you feel about Death?”
    “What?” Cyrus took a small step back.
    “Death,” Skelton said again. “Dying. How do you feel about it?”
    “How do you think I feel about it?” Cyrus asked. “Death sucks. I don’t like it. How do you feel about it?”
    The old man stared at the end of his cigarette. “People say you can’t run from Death.” He shook his head. “People lie. Running’s all you can do, kid. Run like Hell’s on your heels, because it is. And if you’re still running, well, then you’re still alive.”
    Cyrus opened his mouth, but he had nothing to say. The little man was sorting through his wrinkled stacks of paper.
    Skelton examined his tattooed hands. They were trembling, but his voice was calm. “You know what happens when you run too long?” He made a fist and looked into Cyrus’s eyes. “Death becomes … a friend, a companion on the road, a destination. Home. Your own bed. The place where your friends are waiting.