As Cami disappeared into her room, Izabel thought about how easy it was for Andy to find her online. Wasn’t that true for everyone in town? With the directory, you could find out who lived in every house on the grid. This made the killer feel even closer.

Cami interrupted her thoughts. “This one, Mommy?”

“Perfect.” Izabel smiled. “Into the bag!”

In the car, Cami waved at the trees on the north edge of town again.

“That’s my tree friend!” she said.

“I know,” Izabel said.

“What kind of tree is it?” Cami asked.

“Which one?”

“The tallest one!”

“Maybe an elm,” Izabel said.

“An emm?” Cami said.

“An elm, E-L-M.”

“Elllllm,” Cami said.

“That’s right,” Izabel said.

And for the rest of the ride Cami said the word elm over and over, quiet, loud, fast, slow, with her voice high, and with it as deep as her child’s voice could go.

The pool was filled with children wearing the community center’s accepted flotation devices—all different colors but all the same shape around the children’s arms and chests. Andy wore a bathing suit with a skirt around her waist and Izabel felt herself wading a little deeper into the water to hide her thighs.

“I love your suit,” Andy said.

“Thanks,” Izabel said, and after a beat, “Yours, too,” in case Andy was looking for that.

“I don’t know if I’ve told you, but Cami’s adorable.”

“Your Hestia, too.”

“I like to think so.” Andy smiled. “Are you married?”

“Mm,” Izabel said. “Yeah, my husband’s name is Kaito.”

“What’s he do?”

“He drives, controls, whatever, the harvesters. Do you know what I mean?”

“Doesn’t everyone?”

“How about you?” Izabel asked.

“Oh, I’m taking basic income and doing a little legal work here and there.”

“No, I mean, are you married?”

Andy looked down. “Widowed.”

“I’m sorry.” But then Izabel looked confused. She tried to hide it.

“Don’t try to do out the math. It doesn’t make sense, right? Hestia’s too young for it to have been the Turning. He didn’t die because of the air.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“It was three years ago,” she said. “I’ve gotten used to how my life works without him.”

The girls splashed at each other nearby.

“It was a heart attack,” Andy said, even though she clearly didn’t want to talk about it. She asked, “Do you take the basic income?”

“No, Kaito makes enough. Let someone else have it.”

“I didn’t realize how fake money was, before the Turning,” Andy said.

“I think I did,” Izabel said.

“Do you think about it a lot? The time before?”

“I think about my mother a lot,” Izabel said, skirting her obsession with the past, all her time on the app.

“Did she die?” Andy asked.

“Yeah.”

“Your dad, too?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t know my dad.”