What I find next stops my breath.

Thirty-Two

I can’t help it. I have to wake him up. He blinks and looks around, like he forgot where he was. “I found something,” I say, jiggling my foot impatiently.

“Whoa,” he says. “Power nap.” The sleep confusion clears, and his face grows concerned. “What is it?”

I turn the computer screen toward him. “Can you see?”

“Yeah. At the moment.”

“Cool. Look here, where I researched other local news and protests,” I say, clicking over to another tab. “There’s that local cult preacher dude who always hangs out by Water Tower Place—you know the one, right? Same guy as always. Anyway, he’s been shouting about gays taking over the government again, and he’s been ragging on U of C lately because their rights groups have been picketing the guy.

“See this article, ‘A Call to Arms Goes Too Far: Free Speech at All Costs’? The dude has been riling up his followers, saying God wants his cult to rid the country of homosexuality, and that the local Chicago universities are the heart of the nation’s problem and the leaders of the socalled gay uprising.” I look up. “Isn’t that insane?”

Sawyer takes it all in. “There’s a lot of insanity these days,” he mutters. “So you think our shooters are some outsider cult followers of the raging lunatic, coming to campus to . . . do God’s will.”

“I don’t know. But seeing that, plus the graffiti, and the timing of this . . .” The whole idea of it turns my stomach. Who would want to believe in a God like that? If God is not, like, totally in love with all the people he created, why would anybody want to believe in him?

Five things a real God should be:

Not a hater

That about sums it up

After a minute Sawyer nods. “It fits. It’s fucking sad, but it fits.” He looks at the window for a long minute. He’s watching the vision again.

••• The bus stops near the college and we walk to campus. There are more people wandering around today than yesterday. The stop sign has been replaced, all the snow piles are melted, and the tree buds are just noticeably more in bloom than yesterday. The grass is sodden and the botanical gardens on the property look pretty bedraggled, but spring is clearly on its way. And the vision clock is ticking.

“How do the buds and ivy compare today?” I ask. We wander around the quad, really looking at each building now that we have a good feel for the lay of the land.

“Really close,” Sawyer says. We go to the other end of the quad to make sure we haven’t made any mistakes, and sure enough, there are old, ivy-covered buildings, streets, little stop signs, and sidewalks on this side of things too. Sawyer stops in front of a gorgeous ivy-covered building as a few people come out of the wooden door. He stares at it. I read the words above the door. It’s a dormitory—Charles Hitchcock Hall.

After a minute, Sawyer looks all the way down toward Cobb Hall, and then he looks back at the dormitory in front of us. “I wonder if I have the wrong building,” he murmurs. “I mean, just because I see the stop sign in the vision doesn’t mean it’s near the scene of the shooting— they’re different frames.” He puzzles over it some more. “No. It can’t be a dorm room. There’s a whiteboard and tables.” He shakes his head like he’s reprimanding himself. We start walking.

A cute guy wearing funky glasses comes out of the dormitory and sticks a flyer to the building wall. He walks into the quad, heading toward us, handing out more flyers. He looks at us, hesitates, then holds one out and smiles brightly. “GSA is teaming up with the Motet Choir for our final spring food drive and fund-raiser. Meeting in the Hitchcock green room tomorrow night. You should join us.”

I reach out and take it, and the guy moves on, heading toward the next dorm. I read the info. Eight o’clock tomorrow night. “GSA. Gay-Straight Alliance,” I say, looking up.

Sawyer nods, his voice taking on a trepid tone. “Sounds like this could be the group we’re looking for. Plus the time is after sunset, which would make the room naturally darker. Though they’d have lights on, presumably.” He frowns.

“I wonder where this green room is.”

“Let’s go find it.”

We walk into Hitchcock Hall and to our right is a

large room with brick walls, portraits, couches, and a piano. “Green room?” I guess. I see one of the flyers with “HERE” written over the location in black marker.

“That was easy,” Sawyer says. “But it’s not the room in the vision.” He looks all around, as if hoping to find the items from the scenes. “I mean, I guess they could bring tables and chairs in here, and a whiteboard, but . . .” He looks at the windows and shakes his head. “No. This isn’t it. The walls are wrong.”

I flop down in a chair, suddenly weary of it all. Nothing is lining up. “How are the visions,” I say, barely even a question, just a repetition of every other time.

“Bad.” I lean forward and rest my face in my hands. And for the first time, I feel like we’ve completely run out of ideas. “And there’s nothing new?”

Sawyer sighs sharply and I know I’ve asked him that once too often. I cringe, not that he can see it, and follow up with a muffled “Sorry” before he says anything. We go back outside to wander aimlessly around campus again.

Before we can figure out what to do next, my cell phone vibrates in my pocket. I look at Sawyer to see if he’s screwing around, but he’s not. I pull it out and look at the number, and it’s Trey. I answer. “What’s up?”