It was strange to visit.

It was stranger because this was, perhaps just a reflection, a copy. But it was such a perfect copy if you didn’t look too hard at the details.

He felt curiously guilty for wearing his shoes inside. The feeling of them on his feet as he stepped carefully though these familiar surroundings made him walk, carefully, cautiously as though each and any step might make the house shatter or crumble around him.

His finger tips traced lightly over the wall, the slight texture of that old, old wall paper, little stripes of pastel pink and blue intermingled with cream, all of it textured with stripes without color, just raised places that made a small hiss as his fingers passed.

He pressed a light touch to the little table in the hall that once, before his Father left, he had run into while chasing a ball. How old had he been? Four? Five? He couldn’t remember, and he remembered the stories more than the event. He still had a small scar just at his hairline. It had taken 4 stitches, and though he couldn’t remember why, the doctor had used two colors of thread. He thought it was supposed to have amused him. Red and blue… little twists of string that stood out so bright against this dark hair.

He remembered his Father’s large, much darker hand against his own, telling him to be still, to be brave. The man had always seemed a giant, especially compared to his Mother, who as a child had always seemed so ‘accessible’ in a world of titans. Even admirable titans like he’d imagined his father to be could be terrifying at night when you were sure that there was something living in the eves of the house, waiting to eat small children who didn’t know when to be quiet, or when they should stay in bed.

He paused, resting a hand lightly on the knob to the room he had come here to visit, the moment seeming to stretch on for minutes, though he judged it was perhaps a few seconds before his grip tightened on the door knob and he twisted, feeling the small ‘click’ of the latch disengaging against the curve of his palm.

The door swung inward, and made a soft creak sound about three quarters of the way through the swing. It was familiar and yet strange.
Inside was his room, his room of –so- many years before he’d more or less moved in with Jer. Even with the muted feeling colors of Other Ashdown, it did little to change the room. So many shades of grey, a few hints of dulled blues.

He walked forward and exhaled softly, even his toys were still here. It was like the room had been frozen from the day he left. Cleaned and primped the way he was always taught to leave it, but it was familiar.
He sat on the edge of the bed and set his bag beside him, tipping back his head and just breathing softly, feeling the room, trying to decide if any part of it still felt like ‘home’.

It felt… like he did. Like a grey box, with one door, the thought was strange but it settled down around his shoulders like an old coat. Familiar and well worn, fitted to him like an intimacy.

But this wasn’t why he’d come.

There were things he wanted to see… things he needed to test.

He reached into his satchel and pulled out a small cigar box, it had been fit with a crude ‘lock’ meaning he’d taken the thick cardboard and twisted a paper clip through the top and the front lip so that it would not be easily opened, would not easily relinquish its contents. They shifted and slid within, a small crinkle, a dry rattle against plastic, there was a plink of metal, a hiss of some other strange treasure locked up here to be left.

Would it remain here? Would it be here when he returned… would it be in his –actual- house with the slightly brighter colors and the actual bodies of his handful of panda companions?

Time would tell, but for now, it was time to go.