Around the corner, there’s a second-floor addition being built on the bones of a seventies-style shingled ranch house. This street is dotted with smaller homes. I hesitate then take a tentative step then another. I pass the second house on the right. Boone, a dog with floppy red ears, stands behind a chain-link fence, tail between his legs. An invisible hand in the small of my back pushes me on. The third house on the left is where the Baileys live. Their oldest daughter babysits. The fourth is home to Vince and Ted, who just got married. Fifth on the right is the Haycoxes . . .

I need to stop. Another step . . . another . . . another . . . “Stop!” I sit up fast, heart thumping, and peer into the dark to get my bearings. Thomas hangs down over my bunk, so close I can smell the mint of his toothpaste. “What?”

“You okay?”

“I’m fine.” I roll my back to him. He returns to his bunk, bumps his head, swears, then settles. My pulse slows but I’m uneasy. I’ve had the same dream before. It started when I moved to San Francisco. But I’ve never continued down that street and can’t shake the feeling that there was something waiting at the end of it . . . something unspeakable.

THIRTEEN

Thomas

In the morning, Sylvie won’t engage beyond short answers and we eat breakfast mostly in silence. Maybe she’s embarrassed about the nightmare. I watch when she takes Moose off the train at a stop for a quick bathroom break—she didn’t lie, her dog is a pro at this train business. Before we arrive in Portland, Sylvie changes into jeans, a dark blue fleece, and old hiking boots.

“Is that the dress code for High River?” I ask.

She shrugs.

Once in Portland, we Uber to the rental car place, a Hertz set in a low-slung outdoor mall, load into a white Suburban, chosen, I assume, to accommodate Moose’s size. The silent act continues as we head east, leaving the many covered bridges that span the Willamette River that bisects Portland behind. The Columbia River now stretches on our left, miles of wide, dark waters. A brisk wind sends April’s slate-colored clouds skidding across the sky. Now and then there are peeks of blue. Evergreens dot the steep hillsides to the right of the highway, impossibly rooted in scree fields. We pass Multnomah Falls. The massive waterfall, fueled by winter snow and rain, drops over a rock ledge then pounds into a pool at the bottom of a deep ravine. It’s beautiful but savage.

I pull out my phone. “Should we call your parents?”

“I told you, surprise is best.”

“Why?”

She switches lanes so a Tesla riding our bumper can pass. “If they know I’m coming, they might not open the door.”

“That’s a bit dramatic, don’t you think?”

“Did you ever do anything that let your parents down?”

“I stole once. Dad drove me back to the store, made me return what I’d taken and apologize to the owner.” I almost tell Sylvie what happened after I came home, but I haven’t shared that I had a big brother, or that he was in the car with my dad and died, too. She’s adept at mining for weakness and manipulating. I don’t want to give her more ammo than necessary.