Izzy numbly set up a gathering. She chose Bombay Beach because it was where Cyrus had planted the three sisters. Though the plants had withered, Izzy felt, somehow, that the location was right—the place Cyrus had tried to brighten. She picked a date, rented the Silverlight Cinema, opened the wooden coffin-box, and gathered photos of Cyrus for a slideshow. Then she invited everyone she could think of. It seemed meaningless in some ways but better than doing nothing. And now that she believed she knew what had happened to Cyrus, she wanted to see these people all together; she wanted to watch their faces when they spoke.

◆◆◆

Ted, wearing his little round glasses and a black vintage vest over a white T-shirt, spoke first. He stood in front of the white truck facing the dead cars and talked about Cyrus growing up in the desert, teaching himself construction and landscaping, building the shack with Izzy.

“We don’t know anything for sure,” Ted said, though his face twitched when he said it. They all knew for sure. But someone, Izzy thought, someone here might know more. “The cops are working on it, but they don’t have anything conclusive yet,” Ted went on. A few moans and jeers from the crowd—no one out here trusted the cops. “But this is a way to honor him, to let him know we love him wherever he is and to try to help figure out what happened.”

Ted read a Cahuilla poem about creation. Izzy vaguely remembered having read somewhere that the Cahuilla recited this poem when a man died—for women, they read a poem about the moon. So even though Ted had said he didn’t know for sure if Cyrus was dead, he believed it too, she knew.

Izzy sat in the back holding onto Jody who slumped against her. Jody was crying, but Izzy didn’t cry. None of this felt real. And she wasn’t there to mourn—not yet. She was trying to learn what had happened.

Then Ted said that anyone could volunteer to speak.

Seth walked up, a cigarette butt jammed between his pointer and middle finger. “Cyrus, man, I can’t believe you’re not here.”

Izzy heard Nephy sobbing from inside one of the junk cars.