On the floor, legs crossed beneath her, Rose watches the dust motes going about their business in a narrow beam of sun that pushes between the blind and the window frame. She thinks of movies and books and plays where loved ones return from the dead. In fiction, it never works out well for the living.

She taps CONTACTS, then her sister’s number. Five rings, then the click: “You’ve reached Marion’s answering machine. You know what to do.”

Rose doesn’t know what to do. “Marion, it’s Rose. Your sister?” Panic creeps up her esophagus, and she begins bailing out words as if she is drowning in them. “It’s me. Please pick up if you’re there. If you’re not home please, please, please call me back. I don’t know what my number is—oh, right, caller ID. I was in the home, this place, Longwood. I’m not there anymore. I—”

“Rosie?”

Hearing the familiar voice, Rose begins to cry. Through choking tears she gasps, “Don’t hang up. I’m okay. Don’t hang up.”

“I won’t,” Marion says. “But don’t cry too long. My head is about to explode.” She sounds angry.

Rose laughs, mucus running out of her nose. Cell phone clamped tightly against her ear, she scrambles up, grabs a handful of paper towels, and mops her face. “Okay,” she says. “I’m done with that. Thank God you answered! Better put me on speaker. This could take a while.”

“Where are you?” Marion demands. “Last I heard whatsisname, Harley’s son—”

“Flynn.”

“Flynn emailed me to tell me you’d gone around the bend, early onset Alzheimer’s acerbated by shock, and were put in a rest home.”

“You didn’t bother to check?” Rose is getting angry herself.

“I called the home several times. They said you were there but weren’t responsive. What was I supposed to do? Dash out there with my hair in a knot, kick down the doors, and drag you out?”

Marion doesn’t travel. She lives alone with seventeen cats, four computers, two laptops, an iPad, and security cameras in every room. Rose knows she will not leave her home. Though she understands, she is stung. “You could have launched an investigation,” she says indignantly.

“Into what? The last few times we talked you were confused, anxious. You sounded like all the screws were coming loose. You were scared you were losing your mind, that people were poisoning you. You started nailing windows shut because you thought people or poltergeists were coming in and out of your house and moving things around. Then you quit answering the phone.”

A silence follows. Rose is holding her breath. She lets it out slowly so Marion won’t hear.

“I was just glad whatsisname—”

“Flynn.”