Aelise keeps Harley in her room, and allows visits - mostly Corona, sometimes Tima - but doesn't let him run around being obnoxious to anyone. Chelsa avoids him. Corona is home, after all, and he's just as warm and isn't horrible to her. And now she can invite more friends in. There's that girl she rotated out to make room for Tima, still alive, in Wales - there's that pleasantly sparky boy she met on her trip to Egypt - Chelsa is able to content herself with the situation.
She picks him up. He's awkwardly sized, but not hardly too heavy.
And she teleports to his room in the Québec house, which, except for a handful of perishables that would have rotted away if they hadn't been picked up, hasn't been touched for nearly a year.
Zeus is sleeping, arms wrapped around Harley's pillow, tucked under Harley's blankets.
"All right," says Elspeth. "I'll tell everyone you're home again. Do you know how you disappeared?"
"That sounds - maybe a little like what Sue does," she murmurs. "If he were accessible - but he isn't." She sighs. "Thank you. I'm sure Mama will want to talk to you tomorrow."
"Let me know if you need anything," Elspeth murmurs, and she runs her hand over Harley's hair, and she ports away.
When he meets resistance in the form of Harley cuddled up to him, his eyes snap open, and he abandons the pillow in favor of its owner.
"Harley."
"Harley, Harley, my Harley - what happened - where did you go, are you all right, you disappeared right out of my arms - how long has it been -"
"It's been like a year," he says, "a month or something for me, I went to another world, I dunno how I did it, I tried again and couldn't, and then I guess I managed it but I ended up in Milliways - lots of awful shit happened but I'm fine now, I love you - I love you," and he dissolves into incoherent sobbing.
But he will be cried on if that is what Harley wants.