She opens her palm and he drops the key into her hand. She puts it into her pocket. He keeps his smile in place, then turns his gaze to the phone like it’s no big deal that he gave her that key, and she walks alongside him, playing it cool as well.

They walk in starts and stops—stopping to attempt to capture the prizes that Critterscape lays over the digitized homes and yards of Winding Creek Estates. A jogger plods past, then an older neighbor walking her two retrievers. Julia wishes she’d taken Ned up on his offer of coffee. She wouldn’t have to feel she was focusing on the game and maybe they could talk. About everything that was—and wasn’t—happening between them. She watches him stop in front of a house, fingers moving across the screen’s keyboard.

“What are you doing?” she asks. Tensing. “You’re not…?”

“No. I’m just sending a message to someone else in the game.” His gaze is steady on her.

She forces herself to relax. “I just want to catch Critters.” She starts walking ahead of him. After a few moments, he catches up to her with an apologetic smile.

They walk down Winding Creek Trail, the main street in the subdivision; it dead-ends into a park, one with a sprawling playscape for little kids and a large pool, home of the Winding Creek Salamanders, the neighborhood youth swim team.

Julia sees someone sitting on a bench, the person’s back to them as they enter the park, heading toward the pool. A woman. Long hair, stirred by the wind. Even from behind she seems familiar.

“Frustrating,” Ned says, staring at his screen. “My last two Critters have run away. Life is cruel. I swear some algorithm kicks in right when you’re about to level up.”

The woman on the bench isn’t moving. Just sitting there. Julia thinks she recognizes the coat.

“Is that your mom?” Julia asks.

“No. Mom was at home. I mean, I think she was.” Ned stops for a second, as if he doesn’t want to continue. He’s staring at the figure on the bench.

Julia keeps walking. “Ms. Roberts?” she calls. “Hey.”

The woman doesn’t turn around at her voice.

“Mom, are you trying to steal all our Critters?” Ned calls to her. He comes up behind her, touches her shoulder. She slumps to the side. Ned freezes, but Julia keeps walking and rounds the bench. And then she sees Danielle Roberts’s face, purpled, dead, dried blood on her lips and her chin. At her expression Ned pushes past her to his mother.