Despite the cold, clammy fear that ran through me, I managed to fall asleep, waking only when the house settled into an eerie silence. I tried to leave, thinking it was all over, but Christian tugged on my sleeve and shook his head.

I had to go to the bathroom but I sat back down, hugging my knees in tight. Then I heard her voice downstairs, so far away but all too close, my mother: “It’s me. Pick up the fucking phone, dammit. It must be nice being you. It must be nice to go on business trips and sleep with other people’s wives. It must be nice to just leave whenever you want. Leave me with the children. You know, I used to watch all those pathetic mothers on TV, the ones who were in orange jumpsuits because they’d drowned the kids in the pool and I used to think, Who the fuck does that? And now I think I know. Now I understand. Their husbands were off fucking other women.”

Over the years I grew familiar with the types of voicemails Mom left for Dad, designed to get his attention, to get him to come home. But back then, I didn’t know any of that.

Back then, I only knew that I wasn’t safe, that the person who was supposed to love me best in the world spoke of destroying me like it meant nothing at all.

It was my first memory, and in some ways, my beginning, the first brick in a long road that’s led me here.

I’m as alone now as I was then.

4.

We are driving aimlessly through the area and I’m not sure where we are or how we got here. Everything is a blur in the dark. Vera’s car has a moonroof and I stare up at the sky but all the stars are gone tonight, tucked behind a thick blanket of clouds. There’s electricity in the air, it’s going to rain soon.

“Remy?” Vera asks, bringing me back.

“I don’t know. I don’t really remember what happened,” I say, and that is the truth. It was all only hours ago but the night comes in and out of focus. Brightly lit, then shrouded in darkness.

“I wasn’t there,” I tell Vera, and that is also the truth. Snapshots of the night dance in my mind, a broken record on repeat. Little moments shuffling and reshuffling themselves, everything chaotic, tangled.

I close my eyes and I can still hear the gunshots ringing in my ears but they sound muffled, far away. I remember Jack at the front door of the Pink Mansion, saying, “Maybe it’s better if I talk to her alone.” Blink. Elise is out on the balcony and I’m sitting on the stairs and we are not speaking. Blink. Elise puts a comforting hand on my shoulder, saying, “Everything’s going to be okay, Remy.” She says something else, but it’s too quiet, just out of reach. It’s all jumbled, out of order, and I feel disoriented. I’ve been awake for over twenty-four hours, I realize, shaking my head hard. No, it’s been longer, thirty hours, forty maybe.