But I’ve only got a quarter tank of gas left, and no money to refill it.

Finally I pick a spot a few blocks past the high school, beyond the empty, soggy soccer field, where almost nobody comes. I park.

And then I sit.

I sit until the sky above the Nissan has soaked through with indigo, and the few cars I can see in the distance are switching their headlights on.

We’re done here.

Flynn’s words might as well have been a kick in the ribs. My chest actually aches.

It’s an empty, rejected, broken feeling. Like if one of your parents could dump you.

Nine years. Nine years of lessons, hours and hours of talking, laughing, confessing. Now it’s like all of that has been erased.

And I’m totally alone.

Frankie. Last Things. The songs. The way that I could play. My teacher. I’ve lost them all.

All the things you love. One by one . . .

The memory of the black-eyed woman’s words makes me sick.

I’m barely even myself anymore. What else can they take?

I slump back against the headrest. Beside me, Yvonne’s case leans against the passenger seat. Its surface catches a purple gleam of sky.

At least I can give one gift back.

I start the car.

I’m not going to look at Yvonne again. I’m not going to take her out of the case and play one last time. I’m not. I’m not even going to look down at the case, or I might back out. I veer back into the street and head north.

The sky darkens as I drive. Sunset glows through the trees. By the time I reach the Crow’s Nest, it’s nearly black.

The parking lot is sparse. I can see Ike Lawrence’s truck parked near the kitchen door and a few other cars scattered here and there. I don’t want to run into Ike. I don’t know if Jezz or Patrick have told him about the breakup, or if the word has gotten out some other way, but I don’t want to be the one to tell him about Last Things. He’s been good to us. Really good. And now that we’ve become his big draw, we’re ditching him without any warning.

I park way down at the opposite end of the lot. I try to find the very same spot where I parked on the night I got Yvonne. I kill the engine. Yvonne’s case gleams in the thin light. I’d kind of like to give her back in the same way that I got her, but I can’t just leave her here, at the edge of a parking lot. And I have no way to contact that journalist. I never even got his name. Just like the woman from the management company.

I should have known. I should have known sooner. But I didn’t want to know.

I get out of the car. My boots crunch on the black pavement.

I pull Yvonne gently through the door. I scan the lot. There’s no one on the patio, or smoking on the cracked pavement. For once, no one is watching me.