Miss Betty was whispering loudly to a man with a large stack of books in his arms. Evelyn took advantage of the opportunity and slid her hand inside her backpack.

“Can you think of anything that might help us?” she asked, lifting her hand to her mouth and slipping three in before Betty turned to look at us.

I waited until two more people approached her desk before I spoke. “There is something.”

Evelyn’s eyebrow arched up and her eyes opened wide. Now she reminded me of a squirrel with her cheeks full of nuts. “What?”

“I’m not sure it’s anything though.” I was sure. Why was I lying?

“What is it?” she asked.

“Just a name.”

Evelyn pushed her notebook and a colored pencil toward me. She pointed to the blank page. I took the pencil and started writing out the letters of his name. L-I-O-N-E-L.

“Who is he?” she whispered.

I shrugged. “Just a name I saw on one of Leah’s papers. I thought maybe we could check it out.”

She didn’t look convinced.

“Do you think Leah might have something to do with this?” she asked.

I stared back at her, trying to convince myself that I was doing this for Leah. That maybe if I understood more about what happened to her, I would be able to help.

“Franny, who is this guy and what does he have to do with your mom leaving?”

I looked down at my lap and started playing with the drawstring of my pants, pressing the hard knotted end between my fingers. “I don’t know.” Another lie.

“You said his name was Lionel?”

“Yes.”

“C’mon,” she said, begrudgingly.

We went to the table that held catalogues of newspapers in binders. Someone had painstakingly covered each page in plastic but they had still yellowed with age.

“You take this one and I’ll start here.” She handed me one of the binders, but it was so unwieldy that I had to leave it on the desktop to leaf through. I watched Evelyn scanning each page, looking at photos and headlines, trying to find a link to Lionel. Lost, like the last piece of a puzzle. Why hadn’t I been honest with her? I told myself it was because I was being loyal to Leah. But I knew the truth. I felt wobbly, like I was standing at the edge of something about to fall in. I was so used to being the girl that things happened to that this new feeling filled my insides with a sweet, dizzy whirl.

Evelyn’s stack of books had grown smaller, and then I heard her sigh and knew she was close to giving up. We had been there for more than an hour and it was almost time to go home. She flipped through the last book and as she neared the end, the fizziness inside settled down and I felt relief.