Kezia doesn’t like doing this. She, like Javier, is good at protecting people, but not so much at comforting. But she tries. “I thought maybe you can tell me how you’re feeling about everything.”

I roll my eyes. “Mad. Pissed off. Disappointed. What else do you want me to say? It’s done already! She’s gone!”

Even I can hear how my voice gets raw at the end of that, and I shut up, fold my arms over my chest, and slump back in the couch. My entire body screams, Don’t talk to me, and Kezia accepts that. “Okay. Connor?”

“She shouldn’t have lied to us about what she did with Dad,” he says.

“I know that, but are you sad? Or are you mad?”

She’s trying too hard, and I think she probably is as pissed at Mom as we are. We’re not a favor she and Javier are doing gladly anymore. We’re a responsibility. I’ll bet they’re both thinking the same thing: How did we get into this? And how do we get out of it?

I’ll bet we’re all thinking it, but me and Connor, we’re not going to say it. We’re our mother’s children. We don’t want to talk about our feelings. When Mom dragged us to our counseling sessions after she got out of jail, I think I broke a record for the number of hours without talking in talk therapy.

If I want to blab about it, if, I don’t want to do it here. And not with Connor listening. I have to be strong for him.

Connor’s shrugged in response to Kezia’s question, and she gives us a sad little smile like she knows. She doesn’t. “Okay, but you know you can come to either one of us, right? Anytime. About anything. This is a hard day, and we want to be here for you.”

“Yeah. Great. Are we done now?” I say. “Can I go to my room?”

“Sure,” Kezia says. She sounds gentle. “You go rest if you want. We’ll be here.”

Before I do, I bend over and put an arm around my brother’s shoulders. I whisper, just for him, “You can come to me, you know that, right?”

He nods slightly. He will, when he’s ready.

I walk into my room and slam the door. I lie down on the bed and stare up at the ceiling; I twist and turn and put my headphones on, but nothing works. I can’t rest. I can’t sleep. So I pace. I think about Mom. I remember all the things she’s done for me, with me, all the fun and light and laughter she gave me, and I wonder if I’ve made a terrible mistake. That makes me angry at myself, first for hurting her, and then for not sticking to being angry.

I feel so alone right now, and empty, and I want someone to care. Not in the abstract. I want someone to look right into my face and tell me they care what happens to me, and I want it so bad it hurts. But not Kezia. Not Javier.

No. Who I really want to talk to is Dahlia, and I’m not allowed to go to town, or call her. I know why, and it’s smart, but I don’t feel smart right now. I feel desperate. There’s an empty place inside me that’s choking me, like there’s not enough air in the room.

So I pick up my phone, put her number in from memory, and text her where to meet me. I sign it Tana, which is short for lantana, her favorite flower, and she nicknamed me Lannytana a while back.

She hits me back in seconds. ½ hr ok?

K, I type back, and then I end the call.

She didn’t hesitate. It makes me feel warm and nervous.

Connor’s shown me how to do this. I climb out the window and shut it behind me. Boot barks as I hop the side fence, but only once, as if he doesn’t quite know how to communicate that I’m breaking the rules, or he doesn’t really want to rat me out. He finally paces the edge of the fence, then climbs back on the porch and lies down. Guarding Connor, I think. Good. I need him to do that for me.

I haven’t run in a long time, and I need to feel that again. The control. The burn. The stillness inside that comes when you focus everything on that one effort. It doesn’t leave room for all the noise.

So I run. I take off through the woods, watching my footing but keeping to rough game trails until I hit a road, and then running at stride. I see the blue glitter of Stillhouse Lake through the trees in less than half an hour, and I slow down to a walk because my legs are starting to shake. I’m coming up from the far end, by the gun range where Javier ought to be working, except he’s taken an extended vacation to make sure we’re safe.

I wonder how long it’ll take him to realize that I’m not safe right now. And how long to find me.

I stay in the woods, moving carefully and hiding whenever I see any hint of cars or people. There aren’t a lot out today. It’s cold and a little cloudy. Indoor weather, for most folks. The wind’s too sharp for boating.

I’m passing Sam’s cabin now. It’s standing empty, I guess; he locked it up and left it just as it was, so in an emergency I have somewhere to hide. But I don’t want to be guilty of breaking in, either.

From his cabin, I can see our old house.

It’s set back from the road and the docks—close enough to be considered lakefront, but far enough up the slope that we don’t have to worry about flooding or casual visitors. Our house. Except it isn’t, really, I guess. All our good times, all our memories of cleaning the place and painting and making it our own, of evenings at dinner and watching movies and being a family . . . all that’s wrong now. I don’t know how to feel about any of it.

It’s like a museum of someone else’s life.

I slip out of the trees and break into a run, trying to look like I’m just out for exercise and, nope, totally not the kid of the most notorious serial killer in the past ten years—nope, not at all. I don’t see anybody. I speed up as I get to the driveway and race up it, and I get a real good look at the place.

The house was tagged by vandals before we left it, after word about Dad got out and people knew who we really were. The paint’s still there, splashed in insults over the garage and wall. New tags have been added. One’s a crude drawing of a hanging woman and two smaller figures on the same scaffold. Gee, subtle, guys.

I stop on the threshold, breathing hard, and try to get my heart rate down. This is dumb, Lanny. Super dumb. You know it is. Yeah, and I was starting to think it was a bad idea, too. But I’ve come this far. I don’t really know why, but it feels like this is the only place in the world I can still feel normal.

The front window is smashed. I see wind blowing in. The blinds are broken and fluttering like wounded birds.