A boy awakens. The dust of the attic is peacefully settled about him, and the sun no longer streams through the window. Pale light now sifts through, pitiably diffuse and weak. Worries start to nag at the boy, creeping from the shadows and reeking of age. The quiet and solitude of this place, once so comforting, now seem to foreshadow a forgetting and a loss.

Brave of heart and resolute beyond his years, the boy shakes off these doubts. The chest will remain. He will go. There is no other way. When, and only when the time is right may he return to claim his prize, his birthright.

The treasure calls to him, beckons him break the seal of its prison. His hand reaches from across the attic as if to will it open, as his feet will take him no nearer. Thank the good Lord for sensible feet, he tells himself.

His reasonable lower appendages take him down the creaking steps, into the house, back to chaos of a family being torn apart. Not a soul has noticed his absence. No kind greeting marks his return.