Palin was digging a deep hole to their left. She kicked a little spray of wet soil and grass roots onto Aria’s legs. “Palin … quit that,” Luke said, whistling for her to chase a stick that he picked up from his feet to throw for her. They sat watching the river, neither of them knowing what to say, until Luke held the quill of the feather out in front of her, intending for her to have it.

“I can’t take that, I’ll feel too guilty,” Aria said.

“Nah, I want you to have it,” Luke said. “Like I said, I want it to keep you safe and if it doesn’t give you courage and strength to give me your heart, maybe it will give you strength and courage for somethin’ else.”

Aria took the quill from him and smelled it. The guilt she felt made her arms feel heavy. She put the letter and the feather into her backpack and sat with her chin on her knees, watching Luke throw the stick as a distraction from the discomfort that both of them felt.

When they walked back toward the car lot, Luke tried to erase what had been said between them with small talk. He told her stories from his various travels. At one point, he stopped her to look at a dull bronze-colored chrysalis, which he told her contained a painted lady butterfly. “Did you know that a caterpillar doesn’t just sprout wings and turn into a butterfly?” he asked. “Actually, if you opened this thing, all that would come out is this primordial soup. The caterpillar decomposes and it gets totally reorganized back into this whole other thing!”

Aria felt the impact of his statement. As fascinating as the fact was, she knew that he was talking about himself just as much as he was talking about the caterpillar. She was unhappy to have become one more part of his story of things that had made him feel like he was dissolving.

When they got back to the lot, Robert was taking a nap. Palin ran up to him and licked his face, startling him out of his sleep. Darren had changed position, but had not come out of the vortex of his self-destruction.

Luke caught Aria by the shoulder. “I’m gonna go back out there, I think,” he said, gesturing back toward the woods from which they came.

“OK,” Aria said, flustered and not knowing what to say to repair the rupture between them.

Luke pulled her in for a reassuring hug. “I’m here for you whenever you need it, OK? I really like you as a person, not just as a girlfriend or whatever else,” he said.