Even after Amelia’s diagnosis, when Beverly moved into the family place on the Vineyard to figure out what to do, she found herself in the habit of permitting her mother to win. “Calm yourself, let it go,” she breathed under her breath during one of their weekly rounds at Cove Mini Golf. Her mom was performing yet another booty dance to rub in the fact she had knocked Bev’s ball into the penultimate windmill and out of bounds with her own. “She is your shenpa. Your trigger. Do not succumb to negativity.” Of course, that was before the wandering. With Amelia leaving the house unannounced—sometimes with pants, sometimes without; how their roles had reversed—mini golf was no longer on the menu. Her mother was now afraid of random things, like the showerhead, and merely getting her clean was an effort that called for an entire afternoon. Beverly would fill the bathtub and they’d climb in together, like two girls, Bev washing Amelia’s back while singing PJ Harvey songs. Despite her flaws, how demeaning and dismissive she had been, Amelia was the one person who loved Beverly, who would probably ever love her, and she felt that love being taken from her neurotransmitter by neurotransmitter. Thanks, universe. Namaste.

At that, Rex Hasselbach threw back his head and released an intimidating bellow of a laugh. “Yeah,” he said, wiping his eyes, “namaste.” Then he said, Look, I get it, your mom sucks. Do you want to know how I wound up at Jabberwocky? Beverly nodded. My dad beats the shit out of me, Rex replied. The worst time was while they were watching the third installment in the Alien franchise. Rex had an enormous boner for eighties Sigourney Weaver—she was a total babe—and as they reached the climax of the film, where the tiny alien bursts out of Ripley’s chest just as she sacrifices herself for her comrades by falling into lava, Rex’s dad started making fun of the scene, about how stupid and predictable it was, et cetera. Infuriated by this rude interruption, Rex told his father to shut his bitch mouth. His dad dragged Rex outside, though Rex didn’t want to fight and mostly covered his head with his arms. And his dad hit so hard, elbows and fists, that Rex had to go to the hospital for a punctured lung and fractured ribs, where he lied and said he had injured himself by accidentally running into a tree while throwing the football around with his brothers. It was in that hour of darkness that he decided to ruin his father’s life. In his dad’s name and likeness, Rex set up a variety of fake accounts and started posting the foulest content he could imagine. Racist tirades, rape and death threats, and links to kiddie porn. When his dad lost his job and was arrested, Rex’s mother begged Jabberwocky to take him, partly for his protection.

“Isn’t this where Ted Kennedy killed that woman?” Clayton asked.

“Mary Jo Kopechne, yes,” said Laird. “He was drunk and drove his car off a bridge into a tidal channel.”