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Back When the Stars Go Dark Save as PDF
Chapters (83)
  1. Epigraph
  2. Maps
  3. (prologue)
  4. Part 1: Signs and Vapors
  5. (one)
  6. (two)
  7. (three)
  8. (four)
  9. (five)
  10. (six)
  11. (seven)
  12. (eight)
  13. (nine)
  14. (ten)
  15. (eleven)
  16. (twelve)
  17. Part 2: Secret Things
  18. (thirteen)
  19. (fourteen)
  20. (fifteen)
  21. (sixteen)
  22. (seventeen)
  23. (eighteen)
  24. (nineteen)
  25. (twenty)
  26. (twenty-one)
  27. (twenty-two)
  28. (twenty-three)
  29. (twenty-four)
  30. (twenty-five)
  31. (twenty-six)
  32. (twenty-seven)
  33. (twenty-eight)
  34. (twenty-nine)
  35. (thirty)
  36. (thirty-one)
  37. (thirty-two)
  38. (thirty-three)
  39. (thirty-four)
  40. (thirty-five)
  41. (thirty-six)
  42. (thirty-seven)
  43. (thirty-eight)
  44. (thirty-nine)
  45. Part 3: Time and the Maiden
  46. (forty)
  47. (forty-one)
  48. (forty-two)
  49. (forty-three)
  50. (forty-four)
  51. (forty-five)
  52. (forty-six)
  53. (forty-seven)
  54. (forty-eight)
  55. (forty-nine)
  56. (fifty)
  57. (fifty-one)
  58. (fifty-two)
  59. (fifty-three)
  60. Part 4: The Bent Grove
  61. (fifty-four)
  62. (fifty-five)
  63. (fifty-six)
  64. (fifty-seven)
  65. (fifty-eight)
  66. (fifty-nine)
  67. (sixty)
  68. (sixty-one)
  69. (sixty-two)
  70. (sixty-three)
  71. (sixty-four)
  72. (sixty-five)
  73. (sixty-six)
  74. (sixty-seven)
  75. (sixty-eight)
  76. (sixty-nine)
  77. (seventy)
  78. Dedication
  79. (acknowledgments)
  80. (author’s note)
  81. BY PAULA MCLAIN
  82. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  83. What’s next onyour reading list?

“Don’t you,” Lenore warned, the same phrase as ever, but it made sense, finally. She was talking to me about now, about us. The look in her eyes was so cold my heart turned over.

I lunged for her, grabbing up her thick body and catching her off guard. She churned against my chest horribly, thrashing and fighting, trying to get free while I pressed her tighter. Opening the front door, I threw her into the yard and then slammed the door behind me fast, locking it. Then I hurried to my room and slammed that door, too, lying facedown on my bed, roiling with hatred and guilt and shame and who knew what else.

Oh, honey, Eden would have said. Who are you really mad at?

You. But that wasn’t right, either. Nothing was right. My eyes burned. My heart was on fire with emptiness.

After half an hour or so—I had no idea, really—I got up and moved quietly through the house to the front door. I opened it, expecting her to be on the mat or the front walk, but Lenore had gone. I panicked, rushing to find her. But she wasn’t under the hedge or around to the side of the house. She wasn’t cowering near the garage or between the trash cans. I grabbed the boxy flashlight, big as a thermos, which Hap kept in the front hall closet for stormy nights when the power would cut out, and pointed it into the inky night, whispering Lenore’s name over and over instead of shouting the way I wanted to. I was afraid to wake Hap, or Eden, maybe, wherever she was now, up near the stars, or down the ragged coastline, searching and patient, an unhoused beam of light.

Eventually I gave up and came back into the kitchen, collapsing into the chair where the whole nightmare had started, next to the abandoned pile of dog-food pellets. I’d done something terrible and on purpose and I couldn’t take it back just because I felt sorry. Sorry wouldn’t find her. Sorry was maybe the loneliest feeling of all, I understood, because it only brought you back to yourself.

(thirty-four)

As the dog trots up to us, Clay LaForge’s smile is wide, as if the universe has just cracked a joke. Maybe it has. “People always say elephants have great memories, but I’d put a dog up against an elephant any day.”

“I can’t take care of a dog.”

He keeps smiling that mysterious smile. “You know we don’t actually keep them, right? They choose to stay or they don’t. That’s any animal, mind you.”

I’m still thinking of Eden’s Lenore, so the words tumble out of me, unfiltered.

“I’ve made mistakes.”