“I’ll come home,” I said, wondering as I said it how I would possibly manage the trip.

“What? Ella, I can’t hear you.”

“Wendy,” I said, but then the connection cut out.

I navigated to my bank account on my phone, already knowing I’d spent every extra penny I’d earned paying off old credit card debt. There was no way for me to get home from here. It wasn’t just the money though; it was the idea of leaving itself—of leaving now, of leaving Lonnie. I thought, Maybe if he were dead. I guess I didn’t really believe there was any way for him to not survive.

I typed a text. “I heard you,” I said. “I’m so sorry. I can’t afford to travel home last minute. It’s not possible. Please tell Dad I love him. Let me know how he’s doing.”

I pressed SEND and then stood there for a long time, staring at my phone, waiting for a reply.

She finally wrote back, “OK.”

I walked back into the restaurant and finished my drink.

STARING AT MY AUNT’S TWO-LETTER MESSAGE, I REMEMBERED what I’d told Sienna about death with a sick feeling. I’d thought what she needed was truth, but in fact a child survives on stories. She even knew this, she’d been asking for one directly from the start—not a morality story, but a story that broke open the world, that made ordinary things into something more potent, something that gave her instructions, spells, treasure maps. The truth of it didn’t matter; it mattered only that for a few moments she could believe she was in control of the forces of the world, that she might remember that feeling of possibility and power.

32

I TRAVERSED THAT SAME STRETCH OF HIGHWAY AGAIN, TOSSING the cab driver’s card into the ditch, and reached the house in one piece. Upon my return, the general mood surrounding the pink sofa was low. William was in bed, and Lonnie, visibly drunk, was perched on the lip of the couch, drink in hand, James prone beside her, looking tired or bored. Carlow, his back to them, was absorbed in something on his phone. I was reminded of coming downstairs from Lonnie’s bathroom during her birthday party, finding them all stoned, feeling separate from it all to the point of seething. I decided not to mention my dad.

“Where’s Robert?” I asked.

“He went to bed an hour ago,” James said. “And since then Laurel has decided to drink all the liquor in his house as if she were a teenager.”

I didn’t know why he was using her real name, the first time I’d ever heard him do so, as if she were in trouble.

“Elle,” Lonnie said, registering my presence for the first time, “Let you get me a drink.” She laughed, tried again. “Let me get you a drink.”