All day, Wunder waited for one of them to say something, but they didn’t say anything.

In fact, no one did.

Kids did look at him a lot more than usual—sneaky glances out of the corners of their eyes. A few gave him sympathetic looks, their mouths turning up slightly, sadly. And in science class, Ms. Shunem said, “Oh, Wunder, welcome back! I almost didn’t recognize you without your smile!”

But that was it.

Until the end of the day.

“Wundie, we need to talk.”

Faye Ji-Min Lee was at his locker. She wore her black cloak and her lacy fingerless gloves, but instead of the black dress she had worn at the funeral, she had on jeans and a bright-yellow-and-pink-flowered blouse. It was, Wunder thought, a very incongruous ensemble.

“It’s Wunder,” he said. “Never Wundie. No one calls me Wundie.”

“Wundie. Listen. Could you be quiet for two seconds, please?” Faye said. “It’s rude to interrupt. And this is very important.”

“Okay, but it’s Wunder,” Wunder said. “What’s so important?”

As if in slow motion, Faye reached into her cloak, pulled out a bobby pin, and pinned back her bangs. Her eyes scanned the hallways—left, right, then left again. “About yesterday.” She leaned toward him.

This was it. Someone was going to talk to him about the funeral, about his sister. Wunder felt himself simultaneously reaching forward and shrinking back.

“About the witch,” Faye whispered.

This was not at all what Wunder had expected her to say.

“The witch?”

“At the DoorWay House,” Faye said. “You saw her. I know you did.”

Even when he had believed in miracles, Wunder had never spent much time on Faye’s reported paranormal interests: ghosts, vampires, banshees, et cetera. So he hadn’t thought of the porch-sitting woman as a witch. But now that Faye said it, he realized that was exactly what she looked like.

But all he said was, “I saw an old woman. There’s no such thing as witches.”

“Oh, she’s a witch,” Faye said, waving her gloved hand in lazy dismissal. “She lives in the DoorWay House. She wears hangy scraps of white cloth. She smiles and waves at mourners. Et cetera. If that isn’t witch behavior, I’ll eat my cloak.” She held up one side, then dropped it for unenthusiastic emphasis. “So obviously we have to go to that house.”

This was even more unexpected. “No, we don’t. We don’t have to do anything.”

“She’s. A. Witch.” These last words were punctuated with even-longer-than-usual pauses and uncomfortable stares. “And you’re the president of the Unexplainable and Inexplicable Phenomenon Society. You must want to meet her.”

“No, I don’t. I don’t care about her.”

“Wundie.” Faye leaned closer to him, much closer than he wanted her to be. He could see little lines of skin through the black smudges under her eyes. “I know you’re going through a hard time right now. I know you’re very sad. But listen—you don’t think it’s a coincidence that we saw this witch now, do you? The day of the funeral? On my grandfather’s birthday? And your creepy priest screaming those verses? That deranged bird diving at your head? Et cetera? These are miracles, Wundie!”