“So then, there I was, looking all around me, all around the lake, at other groups of kids, trying to find his hair—he had really dark hair, like mine. Almost black. I was looking for it, and not seeing it, and it was like something was winding up inside me, as I looked, and then the winding-up thing snapped and I just started screaming and screaming. And Tali and Hazel didn’t understand, because of course they hadn’t even noticed him. Because he wasn’t their brother. He wasn’t theirs. He was only mine.”

At last, there were tears in my eyes, waiting, trembling, and I could feel the heaving building in my chest and I knew I only had a minute before the heaving turned to crying. I could feel it coming. Like a wave about to break.

“He was mine, Jasper,” I whispered. “My person. Until he wasn’t anymore. And he drove me crazy, because he was always there. But then . . . he wasn’t there . . . anymore. He just disappeared. When I . . .” My words disappeared suddenly. “When I . . .”

“Leah?”

“When I . . . turned away.”

Then I burst. I broke. All through me it came now, like the storm earlier that night. Crashing and throbbing. I curled up into a ball and cried. I couldn’t help it. Right there on the old blanket. I buried my face in the thick dusty-smelling cloth, and I cried. I cried. I cried. Alone.

I don’t know how long I was like that. I cried, and Jasper let me. She didn’t say anything. She just let me cry.

But then I felt her. Not a hand or a pat or a voice, but her whole body, pressed against me, curling around me like Mom used to do when I was littler and I had a nightmare and crawled up into bed with her. Jasper’s chin was on my shoulder, and her knees were up inside my knees. She was there, fitted into me. Her arm crept around me, and she held me, calming the storm. “Shhhh,” she said. “Shhhh. It’s okay.”

It wasn’t. It wasn’t okay and it never would be. But it was still nice to be held. It was better than being alone. Slowly, the sobbing softened. It quieted. Until I was still. But when it was over, Jasper was still there, holding me. The two of us, lying side by side, in the fake light from the lantern. And it wasn’t weird. She was just helping, holding me together. She was just taking care of me. Being there.

“So, yeah,” I said at last. In a tiny voice that didn’t sound like mine. “That was how it happened. That was how he died.”

“And then you came home?” asked Jasper, into my hair, right behind my ear.