Something he had done such a poor job of that he really shouldn’t even try to answer. Except he did know how. He knew the words. He’d just been executing them all wrong. “We must be still—not our hands and feet, but our minds. And know that He is God. That He has not changed. That the same Lord who loved us when all is well loves us still when all is lost. His promises are as true today as they were yesterday. He has been enough to see people through the worst since the dawn of time. We must trust that His love is enough to see us through now.”

He didn’t know if the words could mean anything yet to these two people who meant so much to him. But for the first time in six months, a trickle of peace washed over the rocks of his soul.

THURSDAY, 11 JULY 1918

Lily sat on the cushions on the floor, her head resting against the shiny spot of her wallpaper. The room was dim, despite it being the middle of the day. Her curtains were drawn against the disrespectful daylight, and she’d shunned the light switches.

Brightness had no place here.

Light couldn’t accomplish anything anyway. All this last week, the sun had shone, but it had done nothing to help her see. Her gaze refused to really take in anything. Not at the funeral, the church, the graveside. Not when Zivon gripped her hand so tightly it seemed he was trying to hold her in this world by force. Not when the crush of people descended, or when they left, taking their black clothes with them but leaving their shadows behind.

Nothing could ever be bright again. It wasn’t possible. Ivy, her sister, her best friend, had taken all that with her when she left.

Though Lily’s arm felt like it weighed five stone all on its own, she lifted it. Raised her finger to the flower she always pointed to. Tapped. Tap, tap-a-tap.

Waited. And waited. And waited. Some stupid, childish, foolish part of her certain that if she sat here long enough, it would all return to normal. That tap-a-tap, tap would sound from the other side of the wall, along with Ivy’s laugh. All light. All brightness. All joy.

Tap, tap-a-tap. Her finger slid down the wall, the effort of holding it in place too great. Her eyes burned. She didn’t want to cry again—didn’t know how it was even possible that her tears kept replenishing every day, every hour. Shouldn’t they have run dry?

Tap. It was all she could muster, not even in the right spot. The sound wouldn’t carry so well from that close to the baseboard.

It didn’t matter anyway.

But then a creak from Ivy’s room had her head lifting, her heart racing. Were those footsteps?