‘Do you have any idea why it’d be written like this? The weird capitalization and word choice.’

‘No. I th-thought it was really weird too.’

‘And the … God bless? Roxy wasn’t religious, was she?’

‘Definitely not.’

‘How do you know?’

‘My nana was really religious and, uh, no one really tells me m-much, but I got the sense that that was something they’d fight about a lot.’

My body lights up.

‘Do you think that’s enough proof to say th-that she didn’t write it?’ Ellis asks.

I want to say yes but I can’t in good conscience. ‘No,’ I say, and Ellis deflates. ‘People can say all sorts of weird stuff in the midst of a breakdown, things they normally wouldn’t. Or, maybe far-fetched – could it be sort of tongue-in-cheek? Trying to be irreverent?’

‘Yeah. You’re r-right.’

‘Your great-grandma would have been around during the investigation. Did she know anything about what happened? Or your mom?’

Ellis shakes his head. ‘If my nana had known something then she never said. And Mom would’ve been way too young. Like not even a year old yet. Even if she hadn’t been she definitely wouldn’t help me out with anything.’

‘Why not?’

‘She doesn’t want me looking into this stuff at all.’

‘So that’s why you needed Roxy’s folder.’

He nods. ‘And we’re probably gonna be gone by the end of summer anyway, so …’

‘You’re running out of time.’

‘It had to be now,’ he says, then breathes, realizing. ‘You’re the only one who gets it.’

I muster up all the urgency and authenticity in my voice that I can manage. ‘Ellis, you want to figure out what happened to your grandma? Let me help you.’

‘I m-mean, sure … not to b-b-be rude, b-but why are you so interested?’

Now is as good a moment as ever. I normally wouldn’t have told anyone this. But he’s regarding me with such an honest and quiet curiosity, this boy who behaves like he’s in pieces; and, yeah, I guess a part of me thinks this is a chess move – because everything, everything is a chess move – but I also want to tell him something for no good reason, just because we’re two human beings in the middle of the night who both believe in the same omitted history. Why not, I wonder, tell him everything.

‘My sister disappeared.’

This is a nothing-sentence, really; it’s a string of words so meaningless that I don’t understand how they can even exist on their own. I predict Ellis will stop and he does, so I halt too and face him, so he has to understand me.