And so we do, and the cat follows me, questioning my judgment, asking with its bitchy little face why I’m doing this, why I’ve abandoned reason. It jumps up on a bookshelf as we enter the living room, and I want to ask it if it’s ever had a best friend who snipped the whole communication thread, which was until then reliably woven into the fabric of its being, just because she suddenly had two amazing dads instead of one, just because there was a new girl with perfectly flippy hair. The cat looks away then and licks itself, which is an answer in itself.

Dee pulls a framed photo off the shelf, and together we notice the same thing. A picture-perfect family with one very familiar face.

“Hey … look who it is …”

“Breanne,” I whisper fearfully, reverently, starting to get very uncomfortable. Shit. Now I remember why the house looked familiar. I saw Breanne once on my way home, coming in here. And it suddenly occurs to me that maybe this is a trap. Maybe this whole thing has been some way of luring me away from school, away from any form of protection. My blood runs cold, and I consider bolting. “What’s going on, Dee?” I say, edging backward. Who else is here? I wonder. Are they going to swarm me, kill me?

But she’s not looking at me. She’s looking at the photo. “Breanne.” She puts a finger to Breanne’s beautiful, evil face. “You know, I’ve never been a fan of hers.” She’s wiggles her eyebrows.

I say nothing to this but look back at the door.

“I don’t like this,” I murmur.

Dee puts the picture down. “We’ll go. Don’t worry. But not yet. Not quite yet. I wanna look around upstairs.”

I freeze, watching her. She moseys, hands in pockets, out of the room. I follow her a couple of steps, cautiously, at a distance, and see her climb the spiraling, entrance-hall staircase, feet making no noise on the cushy cream wall-to-wall carpet. All the time in the world. I look at the cat, which is poised, ears perked, knowing this is one step too far.

I won’t go up Breanne’s stairs. I keep my eyes on the door. My body tensed.

“What are you doing?” I yell.

Silence.

“Come down!”

This girl is bad news.

“I’m leaving now,” I shout, and even though I sound confident at the start of the sentence, I lose it by the end, barely muttering the now. But then I hear her close a door, and she’s bumping down the stairs at a hustle.

“Okay,” she says gently, and touches my arm when she reaches the bottom. “I’m here.”

“What the hell is this about?” I demand, practically running out of Breanne’s house. “Are you fucking with me?”