“What do I make of it?” If I were being honest, I would have to say that I hadn’t thought about it much. But it was different, looking at the girl’s photograph up close. According to the date of birth on the poster, she was eighteen. I remembered what it was like to be eighteen. The year before was when Steffanie and I had started sneaking into clubs. A girl that age was hungry for all kinds of experiences, even ones she knew might hurt her. I’d done a lot when I was eighteen that I had told myself I would laugh about one day. The night I let a stranger finger me in the mosh pit of a concert. The time a couple of guys Steffanie and I had crushes on convinced us to kiss and feel each other up in the middle of a crowded party after too many hard lemonades. The pill I took with a boy I hardly knew, thinking it made me look brave and bold and carefree not to ask what it was before I washed it down with a mouthful of Bacardi Razz. Julie Zale was any of us. But one of the mistakes that she told herself would build her character, make her into a woman, had destroyed her somehow.

“I feel sorry for her. Whatever happened to her—whether she chose it or not—probably happened faster and more easily than she ever could have thought. Why? Do you know her or something?” I thought about finding Steffanie on the bathroom floor that night, her face pale, pressed against the tile. By the time she died, it had been four years since we talked. I had heard rumors, though, about her drug use. From New York it was easy enough to dismiss, pretend that it was just hearsay. But at the funeral I couldn’t avoid seeing how gaunt her face had become. I knew that whatever had happened to Steffanie since we left high school had everything to do with that night at the club. I knew, even though we had never talked about it, that she spent the rest of her life feeling like she’d been used up and thrown away.

“Her uncle came to me, asked me if there was any way I could help him find her. But things don’t really work that way for me. I can’t just solve mysteries. Or else I’d be a cop, or detective. Famous, probably. Rich.” She smiled at the idea. Selfishly, I felt disappointed: it didn’t sound likely that Clara would be able to help with the paintings after all. “But things have been weird ever since he came by.”

“Weird how?”