Gary wasn’t sure he should be pursuing this line of questioning without a child psychologist in the room. No, no, of course he shouldn’t. But, although they had Emily’s mother in custody, her father was still at large. The psychologist was on her way, but this was time-sensitive, and he didn’t want to wait any longer unless absolutely necessary.

“How did they hurt him, Emily?”

She stared at the table. “Daddy used the hammer.”

That was consistent with the wounds found on the body.

“Did you see your mommy and daddy bring someone to the basement earlier tonight? Before the police brought you here?”

Emily rubbed her fingers up and down the sweating Coke can that sat in front of her, the one Gary had gotten for her when they first came into the room, the soda that she hadn’t tasted yet.

“It’s cold.”

“It was in the machine.”

“Yes.”

“Yes?”

“They brought her down.”

“What happened then?”

“I was hiding. I’m a good hider.”

“I’m sure you are.”

Emily took a drink of her soda, then set the can down slowly.

“Daddy got out his hammer. When they weren’t looking, I snuck upstairs. That’s when I called the number.”

“911.”

Emily nodded. “Mm-hmm.”

“And why did you call the number?”

“’Cause I like Elena. She’s nice.”

“You’re a very brave little girl, Emily.”

“Is she okay? Is Elena okay?”

A squad had been in the neighborhood and had made it to the house less than four minutes after the call came in. But it hadn’t been soon enough.

Gary couldn’t bring himself to tell Emily. He searched for a way out of the question.

“She’s dead,” Emily said. “Isn’t she? Like the others?”

Okay, definitely out of his league. He needed that child psychologist here before he went any further in this direction, but he needed to be honest. He needed to tell Emily the truth.

“Yes,” he said. “Your babysitter is dead.”

++++

And so, that’s how it was so often when Timothy was working on a book: the characters would speak to him.

Listening to voices.

It was how he made a living.

It’s how you make a killing.

“No,” he said. “That wasn’t funny.”

It’s how you ended up in the White Shirts Place.

Timothy wasn’t sure how much of the material for his novels came from his imagination and how much came from his memory.

Who is Elena?

Who is Emily?

Who are you?

“I’m no one.” Cognitive impairment was one of the symptoms of Morgellons, but he reminded himself that he had not suffered from that. “I’m not in the story. I’m the one making it up. I’m in the real world.”

The real world is a comfortable illusion.

Life imitates art.

No. Art imitates life.

Well, either way, fiction and reality—they were not such distant cousins.