Although I had lacked the courage in broad daylight that afternoon to go any closer to his home or make my presence known to him, I noted the location of the place. My focus had been on Ryan in the hours since; I’d barely had a second thought about the man and his house. But now that I’d seen what I’d seen . . . now I was determined to find this man, to make him mine and to make myself his.

Eventually, I found myself on the sidewalk in front of a set of similar-looking homes, and I gathered, through my wildness and several ounces of rum, that I was in the right area. I decided to go down to the beach so that I would have the same view that I’d had yesterday from the shore. I crept stealthily between houses, jogging over sand that was cool between my toes. I made a beeline for the beach, where I would be outside the reach of the safety lights that most homes had installed above their garages. From the water’s edge, I would be both protected by darkness and able to view the homes from yesterday’s vantage point. As I moved between houses and then through a marshy patch, I crashed through some brush and wet, soupy sand, then over something prickly that hurt my foot. I hopped on one leg, long enough to extract the small, thorny thing that had pierced the bottom of my foot, then I ran over sand that felt like silk. I ran and ran toward the water, toward the moon, my thin yellow pajamas sticking to my sweating body.

I should mention that I have no recollection of what my exact intentions were at this point. Everything was a confused blur, and I was completely alone. The world had just proven itself to be an absolute terror, yet I feared nothing. See, I understood now that my mother wasn’t protecting me when she chased this man away from me on the beach; she wanted him for herself, just like she wanted Ryan. I knew now that my mother was my enemy—I felt this truth coursing through me.

Difficult as this may be to accept, I would say it is a small blessing in death to be freed from the great burden of feelings and the belief that everything that originates from within you is true, can be trusted, and must be acted upon.

20

WHEN ROXIE WOKE for her run at 3:30 in the morning, Keats was still gone and hadn’t checked in. This was not unusual. Roxie didn’t imagine she’d see him until the Jacuzzi repair had been completed, and she guessed something like that could take many hours. Coffee was brewing and bread was in the toaster by 3:35; she wanted to be out the door by 4:00 so she could have the whole circuit done before sunrise. She decided to take Leo down to the beach for his morning pee while the coffee brewed. Leo was slow to be roused, but as soon as he was fully awake, he was ready for a swim. Outside, the moon was low and blurry and the air was thick, with some pockets of strange heat.