“Okay,” I finally say, swallowing. I wonder where Elise is now. If they took her to the police station, if she’s at the Pink Mansion, all alone, if anyone’s called a lawyer for her too. If anyone’s looking out for her. I’m scared for her, I realize. I’m scared for both of us.

“And don’t lie,” Vera says. “I need to be prepared. The truth always comes out with these things.”

3.

At the heart of every good lie is the truth, that’s what Elise told me once. The best lies are at least half-true, she said, like it’s just a matter of mixing paint, two different colors swirling together until no one can tell where the truth ends and the lie begins, a new color emerging.

When the police pulled me away from Jack’s body, they sat me at the back of an ambulance, wrapped a blanket around my shoulders, and asked me what happened. I don’t know, I said. They didn’t believe me, but I wasn’t lying.

The answer the police are looking for does not contain multitudes, the answer they want leaves no room for interpretation. They want cold, hard facts where none exist. Everyone does, Vera included.

Yes, it’s a fact that late Sunday night Elise, Jack, and I were at her house, known to most in the area as the Pink Mansion, named for its blush painted exterior and its massive grounds. It’s a fact that Elise, with her grandfather’s revolver, shot and killed Jack. It’s a fact that I called 9-1-1, kneeled by his side crying as I held him in my arms, as if I could keep him there if I only held on hard enough.

These facts tell a story, but not the whole story—the real story.

Trauma has a gravity of its own, powerful enough to distort everything that came before and everything that comes after. Each wound a landmark on the road of your life. Each wound a signpost marking an end, a door slammed shut, forever closed to the person you could’ve been, the life you could’ve had if only, if only—

But then there is the first one, the very first trauma, and isn’t that where everyone’s story begins?

• • •

For Elise, it began eleven years ago, at the age of six, when her mother packed her bags at Christmastime and left. Elise didn’t see her again until seven years later, at her funeral. She was gone forever, no calls, no emails or letters, and then she died on impact when her car hit a highway median at ninety miles per hour. Elise was only thirteen.

The night her mother left, never to be seen again, was the night Elise discovered that the person who was supposed to love her best in the world was capable of driving away without ever looking back, excising Elise out of her life like a tumor.

For me, it was a voicemail. I was four, maybe five, hiding with Christian in his closet. We’d been watching TV when it began—low, irate voices turned into loud, angry yelling. Christian took me by the wrist and we went upstairs, closed his bedroom door, and sat on the floor, leaning against the foot of his bed to wait out the storm. Eventually, we ended up in his closet, comforted by the small, dark space, the softness of his clothes piled around us like blankets. Outside, the hurricane raged, but in there, we were sheltered.