Marcos and I wear masks of fear until I whisper, “Hand him to me. I’ll do it.” Ricky’s urn is heavy and cold, and it requires superhuman determination not to drop him. I return to the crowd, clutching Ricky in both hands, and Darcy is the first to understand—she mutters furiously under her breath. I reach the hallway’s shadows, where the Reverend is grinning from his wicked accomplishment. Bill’s tear-streaked face is harder to read. He scoffs at the urn, but that amusement dies off into silence.

“I’m sorry,” I say against my better judgment. Sometimes evil deserves a sorry.

“As promised,” the Reverend says, “here’s Ricky.”

“What’s this?” Bill asks, approaching timidly as if the urn were a live, downed power line. Instinctively, I back into Marcos, who stands close behind me for maximum protection. Ricky may be dead, but I’m not letting him anywhere near his dad. “Where’s Ricky?”

A cruel sparkle crosses the Reverend’s smile. “Bill…Connor is holding Ricky. You do know he died, don’t you? Was that unclear?”

My heart squeezes into pulp as realization seeps into Bill one drop at a time. His wet eyes roll toward me. “What does he mean, dead?”

“I mean he’s no longer with us. Last week. He hadn’t been turned properly, a bedsore became infected, and he…died, Bill. Connor was there, weren’t you, Connor?”

My lips open, but only a stunned squeak emerges. Bill’s filthy, shaking fingers reach for the urn, but I clench my arms tighter around the ceramic. Marcos and Darcy close the centimeter of space between us, but we can’t move any farther back. “This isn’t right,” Bill mutters. “This isn’t…I’ve been writing to him. He’s been writing to me.”

“I don’t see how writing a letter would be possible,” the Reverend scoffs. “Ricky’s injuries were too severe.” He withdraws a strip of newspaper on the spot and slides it to Bill. “You’ll be happy to know his funeral was very well attended.”

Karaoke Bill reads what is no doubt the obituary of his son. As he finishes, the newsprint collapses in his fist. “Stop playing games with me!” He flicks the clipping at the Reverend, but the poor man doesn’t even come close to hitting him. “There was no Goddamn funeral! Now, my son wrote me just a few days ago. We’ve been writing each other for months! We discussed everything, EVERYTHING! He forgave me…”