Under_The_Whispering_Door_by_TJ_Klune

“Or I know my limits,” Wallace countered. “What I’m capable of, even if
I should’ve second-guessed some of the decisions I made.” He paused.
“Okay, maybe a lot of the decisions I made.”
Hugo knocked his head back against the railing softly. “But isn’t that life?
We second-guess everything because it’s in our nature. People with anxiety
and depression just tend to do it more.”
“Maybe that’s Alan,” Wallace said. “I won’t pretend I get everything
about him. I don’t. But the world he knows is gone. Everything has changed.
He’ll see you for what you are, eventually. It just takes time.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I have faith in you,” Wallace said, feeling brittle and exposed.
“And all that you are. There’s no one like you. I don’t know if I would have
made it this far without you. I don’t even want to think what it would have
been like with another ferryman. Or woman. Ferryperson?”
Hugo laughed, looking surprised as he did so. “You have faith in me.”
Wallace nodded as he waved his hand awkwardly. “If this is a way
station, if this is just one stop on a journey, you’re the better part of it.” He
was silent for a moment. Then, “Hugo?”
“Yeah?”
“I wish for things too.”
“Like what?”
Honesty was a weapon. It could be used to stab and tear and spill blood
upon the earth. Wallace knew that; he had his fair share of blood on his hands
because of it. But it was different, now. He was using it upon himself, and he
was flayed open because of it, nerve endings exposed.
And perhaps that’s why he said, “I wish I’d found you before. Not
someone like you. But you.”
Hugo inhaled sharply. For a moment, Wallace thought he’d crossed a line,
but then Hugo said, “I wish that too.”
“It’s dumb, right?”
“No, I don’t think it is.”
“What do we do now?”
“I don’t know,” Hugo said. “Whatever we can, I guess.”
“Make the most of the time we have left,” Wallace whispered.
And Hugo said, “That’s all anyone can ask of us.”
The sun drifted slowly across the sky.