Jane did not seem to notice the strange phrasing or the way Ayanna looked away. It had taken all of Ayanna’s willpower not to cross her arms or move her lips into what Olivia called the “clear lies” position.

It was a beautiful fall day—blue skies enhancing the hearth-fire beauty of all the trees. Ayanna felt like it was the first autumn she had ever seen and enjoyed. Her phone was buzzing again in her pocket, but she refused to look. Jane kept glancing at her as they walked back to the dorms but seemed mostly immersed in her thoughts. They were talking about soccer in a half-hearted way, about whether Ayanna should invest in new cleats, she had always wanted Predators, and if the team should practice on Tuesday night, but each could tell the other’s mind was elsewhere. Ayanna was considering going back to get her headphones and take a long walk. Maybe buy a cup of apple cider. It was suddenly beautiful enough that maybe walking out in all these reds and yellows would give her the clarity to figure out what to say or not say to her mom, how to write the paper she had due, how to tell people about Olivia, how to be kinder to herself, how to figure out who she even was to herself, how to get to a place where every time she thought about Olivia, the thoughts weren’t new bruises, but proof of how much she loved her sister. Ayanna felt a sharp mix of hopefulness and pain when she thought, I want to like myself again.

They split ways around the dorm, and Ayanna checked her mailbox. In among the mailings for student tickets to art events and political postcards urging her to vote was an index card. Written on it was Liana, I can’t stop thinking about you.

She read it again. Decided it must be a dumb prank from Stephen and Jane or maybe from her freshman-year roommate or even something someone had found a way to stick in the wrong mailbox, and she chose to ignore it. Stephen and Jane made sense to her; people were always trying to turn the inexplicable into something they could control. Make it a joke, ignore it, try to develop it into a hoax or something only you could understand. She shrugged. Whatever they needed. Ayanna walked upstairs, pretending to be very interested in the rest of her mail. She half convinced herself to go see Carmen the night before Halloween. The person who had been texting her was Felix, reminding her to meet him in a few hours at the woods. She felt a little burst of excitement and told herself it was nothing.