She pulls the dough out and begins forming rolls as Colin watches, just as he has hundreds of mornings in his lifetime. Somehow every movement she makes feels more substantial, like he never noticed how much her experience weighs until now.

“Thanks, Dot.”

“For what? Waxing poetic about dead folks?”

“I mean, when you’re not talking about the hot barista at the coffee shop or the benefits of pineapple for your sex life, you’re all right.”

“I try.” She points to the cabinet above the counter. “Grab my baking sheets.”

Even after the familiar routine of helping Dot bake, Colin doesn’t feel much better. If anything, he feels worse. He can count on one hand the number of times in the past ten years he’s felt this mopey, but the things Dot said were the same kind of things he’s heard his whole life: vague slogans about the afterlife and how Walkers probably exist and maybe his mother wasn’t insane. It’s the kind of reassurance that’s easy to give because, ultimately, it doesn’t matter anymore whether she was. She’s gone.

She’s gone, and his father is gone, and his sister, Caroline, has been gone even longer. Now Colin might be losing it too. It’s the first time since his parents died that Colin is faced so baldly with the knowledge that he’s completely alone in this world. No matter how much they care, Dot and Joe and Jay can’t help him with this one.

Dot finds him sitting on the back step, drawing in the lacy ground frost with a long stick in his good hand. She opens the door, and warm air blows against the back of his neck.

“What are you doing out here?” “Thinking.” He wipes his face and she catches it, moving to sit by him.

“Are you upset, baby?”

“I’m good.”

“You’re not,” she says, putting a warm hand on his knee. “Don’t lie to me. You’re the boy who never stops smiling. It makes it easy to spot when something’s off.”

Colin turns to look at her, and her face softens when she sees his red-rimmed eyes. “I’m losing it, Dot. Like, I seriously wonder if I’m crazy.”

He hates the way her face falls and how guilty she looks, as if she’s responsible for the weight of his tragic life. “You’re not.”

“You don’t even know why I think that.”

“I can hazard a guess,” she says quietly. “You want to talk about it?”

“Not really.” He gives her a small smile. “But thanks.”

“I’ve seen some crazy things in my day. And Lord knows you’ve got better reasons than the rest of us to have some wrinkles in your sanity, but will it help if I tell you I know for a fact you’re as sane as they come?”

Colin laughs humorlessly. “But how could you know that?”

Her expression steadies. “Because I know.”

“Maybe I’m imagining you saying that. It’s okay, Dot. I’m okay.”

She studies him for a beat before pinching him hard on the arm. He cries out, immediately rubbing the spot. Dot has a pretty mean pinch. “What the hell, Dot?”

“See?” she says with a quiet laugh. “You didn’t imagine that. And for someone who’s survived things that would have left anyone else in the ground and lives their days like there will never be any more, sure, you sometimes give me good reason to think you’re nuts. But if you’re crazy, then I’m young and ugly, and we know neither of those is true.”

Colin makes a quick trip to check in on Joe before heading to class and is relieved to see his godfather sitting up, enjoying an enormous plate of French toast and bacon.

“Dot delivery?” he asks. Joe nods, pointing with his fork to the chair beside the bed. “You have time to sit?”

“A couple minutes.”

Colin sits, and the warm silence fills the space between them. It’s their familiar routine: quiet sitting, little conversation. Colin looks out the window, watching students trudge to class while Joe eats.

“Sleep good?” Joe asks around a bite.

“I should be asking you that.”

“I slept like the dead,” Joe says. “Maggie pumped me full of painkillers.”

Nodding, Colin says, “Yeah, you were looped.”

“Who’s the girl?”

Once he processes the question, Colin’s heart seems to freeze, and then it explodes into a gallop. “Which girl?”

“The one who came to me on the porch. The brownhaired one. Wanted to help, but said she couldn’t.”

“She said that?”

Joe sips his coffee, eyeing Colin. “You’re going to think I’m losing my mind, kid, but I’ve got to know: Is she beautiful or horrible?”

“What?” Colin moves closer.

Looking quickly up at the door to ensure they’re alone, Joe whispers, “The girl. Is she beautiful or horrible?”

Colin whispers, “Beautiful.”

“I thought . . . Her face melted right off and then she became the most amazing thing I’d ever seen.”

Colin is caught by a head rush so powerful, he needs a few seconds before he can answer. “It’s probably the pain meds,” he says, swallowing. “They make you see crazy things.”

“No, kiddo,” Joe mumbles, eyes trained on Colin. “That was before I fell.”

“I . . .” Colin can barely feel his fingers and feels like his entire world has closed in around him. “You must be remembering it wrong.”

Joe doesn’t respond, and Colin reluctantly continues. “Her name is Lucy.”

Joe’s eyes close, and he shakes his head. “Well, I’ll be damned.”

Bile rises, thick in Colin’s throat. “Joe?”

“Lucy was . . . the name of a girl who was killed here. Ugly time for this place, must be some ten years ago now. Looks just like her. I’m sure that’s why my mind went off.” He laughs, taking a bite of orange. “Must be the pain meds after all.”

Colin ducks into a computer lab, leaving the lights off to remain hidden. He remembers the first time he did this—high and drunk with Jay after a bonfire and ghost stories on the edge of the woods—sneaking in to see if any of the gruesome stories could actually be true. There were more hits than he would have imagined for something most people wrote off as folklore. Stories of a place where students seemed to die at a higher rate than any other boarding school in the country. But how many schools have such harsh winters and enormous, wild grounds? Colin never understood why it was a surprise that kids died or disappeared more frequently here than other places from things like exposure, pneumonia, and suicide. Even stoned he didn’t believe any of it.

He has a vague memory of seeing the one Joe mentioned, about the girl who died. Most websites have information about the murderer and his subsequent trials and execution; because the murder happened a decade ago, there are only two news stories online from the time of the killing. Colin clicks a link with a photo, and covers his mouth with a cupped hand to keep from crying out when he sees her face.

Her hair is brown, her features less glasslike, but it’s her. Beneath the photo is a story from the Coeur D’Alene Press. Monday’s arraignment of accused serial murderer Herb August Miller, who is being held for the killing of seventeen-year-old Lucia Rain Gray as well as seven other teens over the past eight years has been continued to June 1.

Prosecutors allege the 42-year-old former headmaster of Saint Osanna’s boarding school outside of Coeur D’Alene stalked Lucia for several weeks prior to the murder. The murder of a teen at his school indicates Miller, who previously only selected victims far from his home state, was growing increasingly confident in his ability to evade law enforcement. Miller allegedly invited her to his cabin, drugged her, and took her to the woods, where he slit her throat before cutting open her chest. In what is now believed to be his gruesome trademark, Miller then removed her heart.

Police found Miller attempting to bury the body on a trail beside the school after a young boy saw him carrying a struggling girl into the woods. The boy alerted a staff member, who called 911.

“This is a killer we’ve been hunting for eight years and who has caused unspeakable heartache to many families across the country. It’s possible he would have simply carried on at the school if it hadn’t been for the bravery of the young boy in finding help,” Coeur D’Alene sheriff Mo Rockford said at a press conference early Friday. “The capture of Herb Miller is a huge weight off the minds of national law enforcement, and this community owes a debt of gratitude to the boy and the staff for making the prompt call.”