As I was telling Kael this, a few people came out of the house, a few people went in. Party traffic. The last guy to come out was wearing a plain white T-shirt with a red stain on the chest. I stopped talking when I saw him and kept my imagination from turning a pizza-sauce stain into anything else. Kael kept his eyes on me the whole time. It was intense, the way he looked at me. The bottom of my tummy ached, and eventually I had to break eye contact with him. Pizza-stain guy walked down the steps and got into his car. I recognized him from the kitchen. He was one of Austin’s quiet friends. The quiet guys always left first.

“And what did your mom do when you found her in the room full of smoke?” Kael encouraged.

“She was walking toward the door, straight ahead, like she was going out to buy milk or some orange juice. She didn’t yell for us. She didn’t look for us. No . . . nothing.”

Kael cleared his throat. I gauged his expression to make sure he wasn’t uncomfortable with the details.

“So . . . you know those quizzes where they ask you what you would save if your house was on fire?” I looked at him.

“Not really,” he answered.

“I guess that’s a Facebook thing. They ask what possessions you would save if your house was burning down and your response is supposed to reveal your personality. If you say you’d save your wedding album, that says one thing about you. But if your choice is to save your vinyl collection, that says something else.”

Kael raised his eyebrows, as if he hadn’t ever heard of anything so absurd.

“I know, right?” I continued with my story. “Anyway, it’s so insane, but the smoke was growing and as I rushed up the stairs to get Austin, I remember thinking, That quiz is the most ridiculous thing ever. Who would even think about possessions at a time like this? But there I was, in the moment, thinking about that stupid quiz—so what does that say about me?”

“I think it says that your mind was keeping you from panicking. I think it says that you have good instincts.”

I let that sink in for a moment before continuing. “When I got to Austin’s room, I shook him awake. We ran downstairs together—he was leading now, squeezing my wrist so hard, and when we got outside to the lawn, our mother was standing there just watching the smoke. She hadn’t tried to set the house on fire, nothing like that. But oddly, she wasn’t alarmed. More like she didn’t even realize what was going on.”

“Karina . . .”