Who am I kidding? I have never in my life come across a beautiful image without deciding to force myself into it. I can’t help it—show me a pretty patch of daisies and I’ll immediately sit down in its center, so all the stems break beneath me, so all the petals smear and fold, but at least for that moment I am part of it. Just look at what happened that summer. Look at me now. I stood up and crossed the driveway.

“What’re you doing?” I asked as I approached. She looked much paler than usual. She was pressing two fingers absently to the side of her neck, right below her birthmark. Standing in the expanse of white sand, it seemed as though the sun were coming from every direction at once.

“Taking in the sights,” she said.

The sights: the golden seal on the main building; Harriet and Nisha still sitting together on their favorite rock; the mountain pitching upward, almost over our heads; a small clutch of girls practicing their Mudra Space Awareness on the grass. But these were as usual.

“I’m fine,” Janet said. She let her hand drop away from her neck, took a step toward me, and then stopped, inhaling sharply. She pressed her fingers back into her neck, hard. She walked away from me, and then back, and then away. “I’m probably not dying, right?” she said.

I didn’t know whether to laugh. “Probably not,” I said. “Why would you be dying?”

“People die all the time.”

“Old people. People in cars.”

She stopped pacing. “You know what’s really fucking terrifying about this place?”

I could think of a number of things.

“If someone had a heart attack here, they’d almost definitely die. Even if, somewhere else, they might have been saved. Rushed to the hospital. If it happened here, they wouldn’t make it. We’re too far away.”

“I don’t think you’re having a heart attack,” I said.

“When I was little, my dad took me to the top of the Statue of Liberty,” Janet said. “Into her crown. I couldn’t believe how different the city looked from there. They even used to let people into her torch. But there was an attack, once.”

“What attack?” I said.

“Olivia,” she said. “I don’t think you understand what’s going on here.”

I felt a cold prickle in my throat. Her pressed fingers seemed to be growing white around the edges. I heard someone shout my name. It was Laurel, striding toward us, her eyes hidden by a pair of enormous pink sunglasses.

“Leave her alone,” Laurel said. She marched up to us and pressed her fingers to the other side of Janet’s neck. Janet pushed her face into Laurel’s hand, and Laurel stroked her cheek with her thumb. “It’s normal, darling,” she said. “Strong.”

“Okay.”

“Say it,” Laurel commanded.