Chapter 5 The Mentor's Wisdom

Jonah set the folder down with deliberate care, as if the paper might flutter and reveal something it wasn't meant to. The afternoon light slanted through the director's office windows, striping the desktop in long, quiet bars. He could hear the museum around him: the muffled footsteps of volunteers, the distant rattle of a cart through the storage room, Sage's voice—bright and exact—out in the education wing as she rehearsed a line for a school group. The building hummed with small life, and Jonah drew his breath slowly to match it.

The knock at his door was soft enough that he barely registered it, but the presence at the threshold filled the office the way good furniture fills a room. Dr. Marcus Webb entered in his usual attire: tweed jacket, bow tie, a touch crooked, reading glasses hanging from a chain. His gait was measured, the careful movement of a man who had learned to pace himself after loss. He carried a slim stack of files, a faint smell of pipe tobacco and lemon oil—the scent that seemed to follow him like a signature.

"Marcus," Jonah said, standing to offer the small salute of the day, the tilt of the head that had become their way of greeting. Marcus returned it with a warm, practiced smile that made him look less like a professor and more like a steady lighthouse.

Jonah watched Marcus set the files down and fold his hands. "How are you?" he asked, though he knew what Marcus would answer—something thoughtful, perhaps a little philosophical, always with an undercurrent of care.

"Busy," Marcus said. His voice was that same gentle baritone, the one that threaded classical music through the corridors of worrying nights. "And curious." He eyed the folder on Jonah's desk with an appetite for the small mysteries of provenance. "The new hire file?"

Jonah nodded. "W. Blackwood. It starts tomorrow."

Marcus's expression shifted in that way he had when a piece of a larger puzzle clicked into place. He let his fingers trail over the folder's edge as if reading the ink by touch. "Blackwood," he murmured. "The name has a history about it in Cascade."

Jonah tilted his head, listening for what Marcus might say next. He trusted Marcus's discernment—had trusted it like a boy trusts a teacher—and yet today the curator's quiet weighted it.

"Your father wrote a report on the Blackwoods, I think," Marcus went on, not looking up from the file. "Long ago. Not many records survived the old flood. But the family—interesting people. Naturalists, collectors. Complicated reputation."

Jonah felt the word complicated sit in his mouth like something that could be tasted. He'd always preferred clear lines. "Noted," he said. His tone was factual. "For the exhibit, we'll handle provenance as usual."

Marcus nodded. He had a way of asking questions without asking—of leaving a doorway open for conversation and trusting someone would step through when they were ready. "How are you, Jonah?" he asked, finally prying at a seam he knew was tender.

Jonah set his jaw, the automatic deflection. "Busy," he repeated, and the single syllable was meant to be armor.

Marcus sat opposite him, folding his hands on his knee. He looked at Jonah like he looked at fragile specimens—attentive, patient, respectful of the damage that might show. "You aren't very good at the busy dodge," Marcus said, dryly. "You've been doing that since you were twenty-three. Pretend work is a poor substitute for sleep."

Jonah couldn't help the small, humorless laugh. "Some days it's the only way to make the noise stop."

Marcus's eyes softened. "You know, I lost my Agnes five years ago," he said, and Jonah felt the room tilt a degree. Marcus never spoke of his wife in idle ways; when he did, the words weighed. "Grief doesn't tidy itself in a neat box, Jonah. It hangs around like dust. We learn to sweep it, we learn to live with a few corners unclean. But it doesn't mean we stop looking."

Jonah swallowed. Marcus had been kind to him since the very day he came back to Cascade, the mentor who saw talent and pain and chose to teach both. "I know," Jonah said, more quietly than he'd intended. "You always see more than you say."

"I do what I can." Marcus tapped the files between them as if the paper might be a compass. "Tell me this—do you sleep at all?"

Jonah's reflex was to deflect. "Enough," he said, and then, because Marcus had been a witness to his younger life—because he had been there when Jonah's father left and watched the way the boy folded himself into work—he added, "Unevenly. The reports keep me up. The board keeps me busy. You know how it is."

Marcus's face closed in a sympathetic fold. "Your father leaving when you were twelve did not give you practice in rest, I know. You turned absence into order, and it served you. But there's a price. You don't have to wear the armor alone."

Jonah felt something like the old ache when the memory of his father surfaced—a thin, acid bite. "He left when I was twelve," Jonah said, tasting the words like iron. "I learned how to keep things together because otherwise they fell apart."

Marcus's gaze was steady, the patient interest of a man who had seen the long arc of lives. "And you built a life out of that. Good. Necessary. But remember this—some things are worth the risk of getting hurt again."

The sentence landed like a small stone thrown into a quiet pool. Jonah felt the ripples. He knew Marcus was talking about more than donors and exhibits; the man who had lost a partner understood the geometry of risk better than most. Jonah's jaw tightened. He had other things he stayed from—attachments that made him vulnerable. Marcus could see the pattern. He always could.

"There are rumors about the collection," Marcus said, steering the conversation to a safer place but with a deliberately probing tone. "Unusual donation terms. The executor's letter insists on confidentiality, but asks that the Blackwood specimens be restored and displayed with care. No public names in press releases. Anonymity requested."

Jonah read the words in his head and felt the fact prick at the edges of his control. "An anonymous donor isn't unheard of," he said. "But the board wants transparency. They want headlines."

Marcus tapped a finger. "The donor has some conditions. Restrictive access, controlled viewing. They wanted the collection to be studied, and they requested a specific person to be the lead restorer, though they didn't name who. Strange." He folded his hands and looked at Jonah with that half-smile that said he was letting the conclusion sit for Jonah to gather. "It's a delicate thing."

Jonah considered the practicalities. "We will follow the conditions. Preservation protocols will be followed. The lab needs to assess and document everything. We'll proceed as we always do—methodically."

"In public, yes," Marcus said. "But privately..." He let the sentence trail in a way that invited Jonah to fill the silence if he wanted to. "There are second chances in history, Jonah. You know that as well as I do. Archives sometimes hold people who tried to hide, and sometimes hold people who try to atone. Sometimes context changes the way we read the past. How can we forgive I?"

Jonah shifted, the leather of his chair whispering. "You're being cryptic, Marcus."

Marcus's eyes crinkled in a small smile. "I prefer to be useful. Not cryptic."

They sat for a long time, the office holding them like a familiar room. Outside, a tour group laughed in the foyer; someone dropped a soda can and apologized. Inside, the quiet was a different temperature.

Marcus picked up the new hire file again, thumbing the edges as if the paper's texture might tell him more. He didn't comment on the name, simply held it, letting the presence of the folder be an opening. "Do you remember showing Jonah the restoration lab the first time?" he asked suddenly, and Jonah blinked, not used to being asked about his own past in the third person like that.

"I remember," Jonah replied slowly. "He—" He caught himself. He had been avoiding personal pronouns around memory; they had a way of tripping a wire. "I remember showing someone the lab when I was young. It felt like introducing someone to sunlight."

Marcus nodded. "You were bright then. Still are. But being bright doesn't mean not needing a hand."

Jonah exhaled. "I'm not looking for pity, Marcus. I'm looking to do the work. The collection is important. We need the funds. The gala is next month. The board will expect results."

Marcus's expression softened. "You do the work because you love it. That's part of why people believe in you. But don't mistake the museum for a life substitute. People matter too."

Jonah wanted to argue that the museum was proof that people mattered—preserving their stories, making them speak for future generations. But Marcus wasn't asking for an argument; he was asking for Jonah to consider himself in the conversation about second chances.

"Look," Marcus said, standing and folding the file closed with practiced fingers. The movement was casual, but his eyes held a depth Jonah couldn't quite name. "The collection is delicate, the donor's terms unusual. Whoever the new restorer is, we'll need to support them. People who do restoration work—hands like Hummingbird hands—carry a tenderness that is not always safe for them. Remember to protect your team."

Jonah felt the line in the shoulder he kept tight relax just a fraction. "I'll make the plan," he said, quietly. "I'll make sure the lab is ready."

Marcus pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose and looked at Jonah squarely. "And personally? Are you willing to let new things in?"

Jonah's laugh was short. "Do you mean a new donor? New board members? Or—"

Marcus held up a hand. "Don't deflect. I mean people."

Jonah stared at the older man who had become something like a father figure. Marcus had seen him through awkward adolescence, through a young man’s hard years, through the slow building of a museum that had become his anchor. "It's complicated, Marcus," Jonah admitted. "The museum is my life. My father left when I was twelve. I built walls for a reason."

Marcus's face softened into an understanding many older men had: the acceptance that people carry the same ghosts in different clothes. "I know," he said. "And yet—some things are worth the risk of getting hurt again."

Jonah looked down at the file on his desk, at the clean, inked letters: W. Blackwood. He imagined a woman—skilled hands, an artist's patience—entering the lab tomorrow. He imagined introducing her to the staff, showing her where the pins lived and how the glue set in humidity. He imagined the way his heart would do that small, unexpected lurch when a past crossed a present.

Marcus rose, smoothing his sleeves as if arranging himself for departure. He walked to the doorway and paused, turning back with an almost conspiratorial look. "One more thing," he said, lowering his voice. "The donation's terms included a clause about family history—something the donor wanted kept private for now. It strikes me as a story that might untangle a few old knots."

Jonah felt the hair on his arms prick with a small electric note. "Family history?"

Marcus nodded, eyes steady. He folded his hands and let Jonah keep the rest. "Just keep your mind open, Jonah. And your hands are steady."

As Marcus left, he gave Jonah a look that was part fatherly warning and part gentle encouragement—the kind of look someone gives when they know a truth you don't and are waiting to see what you do with it.

Jonah sat with that as he straightened the folder on his desk. W. Blackwood. He ran a thumb along the edge of the paper and tried to make sense of the small, insistent tug in his chest.

Marcus's final look: he knows something Jonah doesn't