During the week that she was in the Catskills, I tried to be with Carolyn as much as possible. We went to a movie in Margaretville. We rode the ski lift on Belleayre Mountain to take pictures of the scenery. We walked in the hills behind the Inn, though I avoided the birch tree where I had spent so many hours with Amy. We went into Arch’s for milk shakes and to hear Arch’s stories. Carolyn said nothing, but I knew she was aware of the stares and the whispers. When I introduced her to Avrum, he faked his act of craziness and babbled about the new names he had ordained on immigrants at Ellis Island, and then he closed his eyes and pretended to be sleeping. Carolyn, like others, thought he was insane.

There were moments with Carolyn that were as warm and as tender and as full of wonder as the moments we had known in high school, but the aftermath of those moments carried a sickness of confusion. How can I do what I am doing? I wondered. How can I see only the face of Amy when I am alone?

Carter was conspicuously absent during Carolyn’s visit. Always there was an excuse—problems with Rene, problems with his car, problems with his finances, the need to spend time with his parents in Phoenicia.

He talked to me only once about Carolyn, after I forced him to go with me to the swimming pool late one night.

“Bobo, I’m going to be honest,” he said. “Carolyn’s nice. She’s one of the most pleasant people I’ve ever met, and she’s pretty. You were damn right about that. God knows, it’s a miracle she has anything to do with you. She’s great, Bobo, but she’s not Amy. You know that and I know that. I also know you feel like shit. Amy’s gone, and you miss her. Carolyn’s here, and you’re ass deep in guilt because of Amy, and you’re also scared to death Carolyn’s going to find out what’s really been going on this summer. Well, I don’t think she will. For some reason that totally escapes me, people seem to like you. You’ve got a lot of friends. They’re not going to dump on you.”

It was curious that I now thought of Carolyn from those few days in the Catskills. I wondered if it was a mind game. A turning of the tables. A payback. It was as though Carolyn was, for the first time, one of the ghosts who waited for me in Pine Hill, and thinking of her was the haunting of the guilt that Carter had recognized.

In an odd, disturbing way, I wanted to be with her.