And the next day, they went back to the DoorWay House for more.

Every day that week, the witch gave them letters. Letter after letter after letter. Letters to teachers and letters to neighbors. A letter to the owner of the Snack Shack and a letter to Wunder’s mother’s boss, Mrs. Atkins. A letter to Ms. Shunem and a letter to Vice Principal Jefferson. Letters to workers at SunShiners and letters to doctors at the hospital. A letter to Father Robles, who hugged Wunder and didn’t say a word about the Sundays he’d missed, and a letter to Faye’s pastor, Pastor Chung, who accepted it with a look of weary resignation at Faye’s cloak.

Often, Wunder wouldn’t recognize the name on a letter. But then he would open The Miraculous. He would turn page after page after silver-leafed page until he found the miracle connected to the name. He would read the story and remember the first time he’d heard it.

Most letters, he and Faye would leave without a word. Wunder would tape the envelopes to the doors, because he didn’t want them to blow away.

But sometimes, the recipients were there.

“I don’t know what this says,” Wunder would say, “but I know you’ve seen miracles and I know you’ve seen loss. And I think this letter has to do with both.”

He would stay sometimes while they read The Miraculous entry, while they read the letter. And he would feel the ghost of that old feeling, the feeling that he was connecting the dots of people’s souls.

It was different though. Before, he had collected the miracles for himself. Now he was sharing them.

One afternoon, he and Faye were in the cemetery, searching through The Miraculous for the most recent batch of names.

“I wonder if my mom will get a letter,” Faye said. She was lying on her stomach in the stubbly grass next to the stone, her cloak streaming behind her like a parachute.

“Your mom?” Wunder asked. He had in fact been thinking of his own mother ever since he realized who was getting the letters. He had been thinking about delivering a letter to her, an envelope with Austra Ellis written on it, the black tree reaching out.

“Yes, my mom,” Faye said. “Her father died, remember? My grandfather?”

“I know,” Wunder said, although he hadn’t remembered in that moment. He tried to make it up to her by asking, “But you were closer to him than she was, right?”

Faye was quiet for a long time, even longer than she was usually quiet. “I was close to him in one way,” she replied, “and she was close to him in another. But we don’t really get along, my mom and me. My grandfather never liked that. That was something he said to me before he died. He said, ‘This will bring you closer together. That’s what losing someone does.’” She wrapped her cloak around herself, tight, tight. “But I don’t think it has.”