“Is that all of it?” she said, nodding at the ammo.

Troy dropped the bottles in the sink with a clatter. He wiped sweat from his brow, eyes wide with adrenaline (or, she wondered now, with something harder?) and said, “The man’s room’s a rat’s nest.”

In those days, Clark had still been sore that Troy, the only person on the planet who could calm their father, had moved away. “Took you enough time to get here,” she had said. “The highway from Rockdale get longer this afternoon?”

At first she’d thought Troy hadn’t heard her. He seemed interested only in studying the sprawling Flats outside the window.

“I have to tread so careful around here, Star,” he said at last.

She had not taken that well. She had not taken that well at all. He had to tread careful? He had not been the one living alone with a drunken animal for a year. He had not been the one with the gun pointed in his face that fucking afternoon.

He was not the one who, despite every achievement, was perpetually known as “Troy Clark’s sister.”

No. She ran Troy from the house that evening and told him to tread his careful way home. She had spat on his truck. Hell, she shouted, if it were such a strain then maybe he should never come back at all.

It was the last time she ever saw him. She hadn’t expected him to take her seriously, but there you go.

But what did any of that matter now? Why did that memory come back to her, why those words specifically—“I have to tread so careful”?

“If you play them back you can guess the answers.”

Her phone buzzed. She snatched it off the counter.

“Christ, Clark, I’ve been trying to reach you for an hour.” It was Joel. He was driving somewhere, by the sound of it.

“I was sleeping,” she lied, not caring for his sharp tone. “You might try it.”

“I envy you. I’ve been trying to sleep for days.”

Clark felt that prickling heat in her scalp again. “Have you been having strange dreams?”

“It sounds like everyone has,” he said, sounding annoyed she would mention it. “Clark, listen to me, that’s not why I called. I think whatever happened to Troy happened to Dylan—”

“Joel, I’ve been over all this with Investigator Mayfield—”

“They were gay, Clark.”

The sound of Joel’s car seemed to fade in her ear. The table grew distant. Her brother’s face appeared briefly in front of her kitchen window as Joel Whitley, very distantly, said, “Troy and Dylan, they were both gay.”

THURSDAY

SMOKE

JAMAL

Jamal’s mother pulled up to the front of the school. “Your father and I gave you too much rope.”

“It’ll be fine,” Jamal said, and told himself he meant it.

His mother said nothing as he climbed down from her car. He would learn later that her next stop was a lawyer’s office.

He pushed open the school’s front doors and stepped into a trembling tunnel of green and yellow crepe. The cheerleaders had arrived early, he saw, and thrown themselves into the spirit of the biggest game of the season. He shouldn’t be surprised. This town would never allow something as trivial as a homicide to stop the Bison herd.