She opened his underwear and sock drawer and placed everything on the bed, shook each item out and refolded it, putting it back where it had come from. A few small burrs clung viciously to one of the socks, and she pried the prickled balls loose with the tips of her fingers and threw them in the trash. His boxers looked tattered and faded, and she found herself not aroused but only saddened at the sight of them; she’d planned to buy him new ones for Christmas.

Lastly, she took all of his shoes out of the bottom of the closet and lined them up by the bed. Converse, running shoes, work boots, one pair of worn black Doc Martens dress shoes similar to the boots he’d been wearing the day he vanished. Cyrus was more fashion-and-brand-conscious than Izzy was; he scoured thrift stores for the exact right thing. He’d been so happy to find two pairs of Docs in his size.

I’m not going to cry about his shoes, she told herself. Just shoes, that’s all.

Izzy picked up Cyrus’s phone. She typed in 199092. Their birth-day years. Nothing.

She looked at the blank phone screen, a little glass box like the one the red-haired girl had mentioned. Izzy thought of the gasping carcasses of fish bones. For the first time since the morning Cyrus had disappeared, she felt the full weight of dread leadening her bones.

Common Disaster

CAL, the Imperial Valley prison, reeked of cow dung for miles around. Birds fried daily on the electrified fence that had been constructed to kill prisoners in an instant. The place blended into the landscape, like a pockmarked gray building might look on the moon. Nothing as far as a dry eye could see. A blue-clad prisoner, trying to escape, would be easy to pluck off that wasted land.

When she finally got her appointment, two weeks after Cyrus disappeared, Izzy dressed in the appropriate attire. No blue jeans or chambray work shirts, the website said; nothing too similar to what the prisoners wore. Luckily, she only owned black clothes. In all black, she drove through that moonscape. Braved the breathless isolation of the metal detector to see Cyrus’s brother.

◆◆◆

Joe sat hunched, vulturine, wearing the blue shirt and jeans. Looked a lot thinner than when he’d been put away. More tattoo ink blackened his neck and arms in spirals and lines; she could see when his sleeves rode up.

“Damn, girl, it’s been a while. Brought me some candy?”

She’d tried to bring a bag of fun size chocolate bars the first time she and Cyrus had come to see his brother at CAL, but food wasn’t allowed, and she’d had to throw it away in the bin outside. Should have known better. “Sorry, Joe.”

“Damn. Sucks. I’m jonesing for some sugar.”

“All I got are questions,” she said. Jody had let Joe know Cyrus was missing.

“And I don’t have answers.” He scrutinized her face. “You don’t look so good.”