I flip on the lights. My house is a small bungalow on a semiquiet street. It’s one story, with an attic that’s been turned into the primary bedroom. The inside smells of birch and lemon and damp autumn leaves. There’s no foyer, and the house is built shotgun-style—you open the front door and can see straight to the back. Not the kind of place you could walk out of the bathroom at night with lights on and towel off, at least not without giving your neighbors an eyeful. The house received a quick renovation before I bought it, so it’s got the whole open-concept thing going for it. When you walk in, there’s a couch and a couple of chairs facing the fireplace on your left. A wall with a hand-me-down armoire on the right. If you keep walking, you’ll find the long dining room table I inherited from an aunt, and then a kitchen that feigns openness with half a wall blown out and a small square of appliances in a room with yellow laminate flooring. My guess is the money ran out before they could make upgrades to the wooden cabinets and bronze-colored hardware. But I’m proud of this house where everything has its place and is ordered in a way that’s all mine. With the chaos and mess outside, its birch floors and thick white paint, battered records, and unwashed wineglasses are my refuge. Buying it was my first real adult decision, and sometimes when I hear the house groan as it settles, I think we’re growing older together.

An owl hoots lazily outside. I put on a record and head for the kitchen, thinking about Jay Kemp. By now, his death will be all over the news. Nothing fascinates the good people of Athens more than a life snuffed out at its prime. I hope Truman’s been able to notify the parents. Try not to picture their faces as I pour myself a glass of wine and scrounge around the cabinets for something that looks edible. I settle on a can of tomato soup and heat it on the stove instead of in the microwave, telling myself this makes it healthier somehow.

As I stand spooning soup out of the pot and listening to Dylan sing about another lifetime, I close my eyes and replay the scene from this morning. The smell of coffee, the brightening sun, and then the sound of screaming.

What was missing? I think.

But I know—the squeal of the brakes. You always hear the grating shriek of metal against metal first—and then, driven by some perverse instinct, listen for the crash. I heard it in reverse. I’m certain. A thud—somewhere under students talking in the hall and my mother’s evaluating gaze—and then the scream, but of the witnesses, not the brakes.