Tessa read, and every word was a way for her to put more distance between her feelings and her awareness of her feelings, as if maybe, just maybe, by gorging herself on a story, by swallowing it whole, all the squibbles and frozen black letters would quiet the nameless ache inside of her.

The bell rang, and everyone shuffled out of the room toward the cafeteria.

“Watch out,” she said as a boy brushed past her.

“You okay?” Candice asked her.

“Yeah. It’s just that I suffer from triptostupophobia.”

“What’s that?”

“The fear of stupid people tripping and falling on me.”

“I don’t think that’s a real fear.”

“It should be. I’m scared of it.”

“No, you’re not.”

“Whatever.”

On her way to the caf, Tessa checked her messages and found a text from her mom asking her to give her a call.

She felt her chest tighten. Her mom knew all about the no-cell-phone policy at school, and she wouldn’t have left a message like that unless something was up.

When Tessa tried the number, no one answered. She couldn’t remember exactly when her mom’s flight was supposed to take off, but she figured that she was probably either in the car on her way to the airport or in the air somewhere, so she left a text rather than a voicemail telling her that she’d talk with her later, as soon as school was done.

And then, as she ate by herself in the back of the caf, she again turned her attention to the novel and the welcome, necessary escape offered to her in the delicate, haunted prose of Timothy Sabian, a man troubled so much by looking without flinching at the truth of the world that his words veritably shuddered with despair and with the desperate wish that somewhere out there, there was hope.

Yeah, this guy really seemed to understand the need for escape.

The need to leave this world behind.

And to unchain yourself from the glaring, intractable pain of daily life.

44

Half an hour ago, I’d heard back from Calvin that noon at the Mystorium would work for him, and now I arrived five minutes early.

Over the course of the morning, the lab had confirmed that the head of the mannequin was formed out of Selzucaine along with a cellulose-based starch to help it keep its shape.

The team didn’t find any more mannequin body parts at or near the grave of James Leeson.

I hadn’t been able to locate the connection between the victims on any deeper levels.

I wondered how Mannie might be connected to Jon’s death, or if perhaps there was more of a connection with the senator himself. In either case, it justified taking a closer look at the other people who’d attended the funeral and their relationship with the senator.

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