But Elliot doesn’t pick up the camera. “What was it?” he asks. “What did you see? You don’t have to carry this inside.”

I swallow hard, weighing my options. Here’s this guy, asking me wholeheartedly what’s wrong, and I don’t even have the decency to tell him the truth?

Beth’s impatient voice crackles through the walkie. “Elliot? Ange? You copy?”

We stare at the walkie. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” I say.

Elliot nods. “Yeah. Maybe,” he replies. “The thing is, Ange, Jackson can talk all he wants about how your mom was crazy, and maybe that’s his way to deal, and maybe he really believes what he’s saying, but life isn’t that black and white. There’s a lot in this world we don’t understand. A lot in this world we can’t understand.”

“My mom was crazy, El. She slit her wrists.”

“I’m just saying,” Elliot says, and what he says next, he says very slowly. “Maybe, just maybe, all these years later, it wouldn’t be so bad to consider the possibility that life is all kinds of grey, and that your mom might have been dialed into something that was beyond all of us.”

I feel as if I’ve been punched in the throat. Having Elliot articulate what I’ve been thinking solidifies my gut instinct in a way that’s hard to ignore. I try to keep calm.

“I’m not saying you have to believe it,” Elliot says. “But at least consider there may be something else at play.”

“Didn’t take you for a believer,” I reply.

“Me neither.” Elliot smiles.

“He-llo?” Beth’s static-filled voice rings out between us. “Guys?”

“Yeah,” I say. “Copy.”

“Tell Elliot to check his feed. We’re in the dark here.”

Elliot gives my hand a squeeze. He searches my face. I’ve done so well to cover up my feelings over the years, I know he won’t find any answers there, but the fact that he’s looking lights a small, pulsing hope in my chest.

I hold up the walkie. “Starting in the North hall.”

Walking down the corridor, I picture Mrs. Green leaning forward with Jackson and Beth as they watch the monitors. No doubt Jackson will be playing up the magnificence of my gift, how I’ve changed so many lives, how I can transform Mrs. Green’s world, too. Elliot’s footsteps pad softly behind me. I try to stand up straighter for the camera, to pretend that I know what I’m doing.

We enter a study with tiny combo desks overrun with cobwebs. It’s a long ignored space, and a thick coating of dust clings to every surface. I hold onto my flashlight like a lifeline, letting the rakish light illuminate the walls.