“Yeah. I think so. He must have admitted it to her on the way to get you in the city, because I could tell she’d been crying. She never looked at me.”

“You shouldn’t have done it,” said Marie. “That was their business, not yours—or Sage’s. And now Charlotte will know.”

The thought of hurting Charlotte tightened my insides. She had always been kind to me, and I loved her ferociously for liking my father. I couldn’t even bring myself to tell Thomas and Marie that I had only told Sage in order to crush her own idea of her father when I thought she’d questioned mine.

We waited for Mom to call. When it was almost dark, I dialed Information and asked for the number of Phoenixville Hospital, then called and asked if I could speak to Wilson McVay. I got connected to the nurses’ station, and a woman told me he couldn’t receive calls. Marie called her boss to say she wouldn’t be in for the next few days, that her younger siblings had been victims in a criminal incident, and we still hadn’t been able to contact our mother.

Mom called at nine. Marie spoke to her and outlined everything: what happened to Ellen when Mom kicked her out of the car, Barbie Man showing up at the fireworks, Thomas and me being vigilantes, stabbing and shooting the man with a dart gun but not doing a good enough job of it to kill him. Marie was trying to give the facts but be funny. It was like she was the mother, trying to reassure Mom that it wasn’t such a big deal and we were all fine. Our mother stayed quiet on the phone. She listened and then said she was on her way. She was leaving North Carolina and driving all night. It would be nine hours before she got back to the mountain.

Wilson was sitting up when we went in to see him, me, Marie, Thomas, and my mom. Every speck of skin on his face was bruised, even his eyelids. The swelling had distorted its shape. He’d had surgery to wire his broken jaw shut, and they’d inserted a chest tube through his ribs to drain the air around the lung, where a broken rib had punctured it. He would recover, but it would take the rest of the summer.

“Libby,” he wheezed when we came into the room. “My gallant knight. Did they cut your hair as ritual punishment?” His voice was hoarse from surgery, and it was hard to understand him talking through closed teeth.

“You look dreadful.” Marie said what we were all thinking.

“Thank you very much,” he said.

“Hi, Wilson.” Thomas was hanging back in the room, uncertain how to act.

“Hey, Thomas. Thanks, man. You and Libby.”