Everyone brings food to a funeral. They treat it like it’s some sort of party, with these stupid paper plates that are too small to hold anything and casseroles you dish out with other people’s serving spoons.

“You can just return it whenever it’s convenient. Don’t even worry yourself over that now.”

People say dumb things like that. Or She looked so beautiful, didn’t she? Like no one thinks it’s creepy that you’d put a nice dress and makeup on a dead person to make them look alive again. Or It was a lovely service. No, it wasn’t. It was hot in there, and my tie is chafing my chin. And it wasn’t lovely, it was sad. That’s why people were crying.

“Nicky, don’t you look handsome,” Mrs. Tillman says, suddenly forgetting that she had a lawyer send a letter to my parents demanding payment for the damage the synthesizer caused her store’s intercom.

“Thanks,” I say, standing. “I’m going to get more food.”

“Boys. I swear, if I ate like they did, I’d drop dead of a heart attack right here.”

It was already quiet in the house, just lots of mumbling and sniffing. Now you could hear a squirrel fart.

“I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was—”

“It’s okay, Marcia. Just shhhh, let’s go check on the kids.”

In the kitchen, I open and close some cabinets just to look busy. I avoid teary gazes and mournful nods in my direction until everyone finally leaves and I’m alone to contemplate how I’ve never been alone in this room. Actually, I’ve rarely ever been alone anywhere in this house. It’s like someone was always watching what I was doing: I’d go to open a door, and out would pop Mr. Peterson. I’d wander down a hallway I’d never seen, and here Aaron would come, pulling me away toward his room or the kitchen. Even Mya seemed to linger on me. In fact, the only one who never seemed to pay me much mind was Diane Peterson.

Mom and Diane are actually a lot alike. Were a lot alike. Mom laughs at jokes Dad calls low-class, and she gets a headache when she drinks red wine. She likes cats and hates birds, and even though she says she likes dogs, I think she just says that so people don’t think she’s some kind of monster. Diane was the same way. But then she would drift, her thoughts wandering the way my grandma warned me not to let mine. She’d reminisce about the way Raven Brooks used to be, how welcoming and kind. She’d talk about neighbors who used to live there, and ones who still did but didn’t come around anymore. She’d talk about the trips their family took to London and Berlin and Tokyo, invited by theme parks seeking Mr. Peterson’s expert eye.

We wanted a quieter life, though, Diane said once, then smiled ruefully, and I know she was remembering how the aftermath of Lucy Yi’s death was anything but quiet.

Out the kitchen window, I see Mom and Dad huddled close to each other in the backyard, peering over their shoulders to make sure no one is around. They’re probably saying something inappropriate, something they’d scold me for saying. Or maybe they’re just trying to figure out how someone could be here one day, on the road to the outlet mall thirty miles away to buy Aaron and Mya new jackets, and then … gone.

“Poor little thing. Imagine being ten years old and losing your mother. I didn’t even see her at the funeral.”

Mrs. Tillman appears in the kitchen doorway and stops talking when she sees me, then looks to the woman I think is Aaron’s aunt.

“Lisa, this is little Nicky,” she says. “Aaron’s friend from across the street. His family moved in this summer.”

“Nick,” I say, and Mrs. Tillman’s lips tighten.

“I’m going to find Aaron,” I say. I don’t mean to be rude. Mom would have pinched the back of my arm if she’d overheard, but I don’t feel much like making other people feel better at the moment, and I’m pretty sure the only other person who’s going to understand that is Aaron.

I walk upstairs and leave the low murmur of mourning under me. It’s stuffy upstairs, but the air still feels lighter than it did down there, and I take a few breaths and head for the room at the end of the hall. Before I get there, I have to pass the master bedroom, though, and I’m surprised to see Mr. Peterson standing there, staring at the bed. It’s made, and I wonder if he made it this morning because he knew people would be coming over after the funeral. Or maybe he hadn’t slept in it at all.

He’s turned a little to the side, which is why at first I think he’s staring at the bed. It isn’t until I get a little closer that I realize he’s not looking at the bed at all. He’s looking at the mirror beside the bed. Only, I don’t think he’s looking at himself. I think he’s staring at something else he can see in the reflection. I try to see what he sees, but I’m too far away, still out of the range of the mirror and far enough down the hall so my reflection isn’t there yet. I look at the wall beside me, but nothing seems out of the ordinary, nothing to be staring at the way he is—not aimlessly like he’s daydreaming, but like he’s watching something.

All of a sudden, I feel like I shouldn’t be here, like I’m intruding even though I’ve spent almost as much time in this home as I have in my own. I want to run down the hall to Aaron’s room, but whatever’s going on with Mr. Peterson feels like something I shouldn’t interrupt. If he didn’t look so upset, I’d think he was praying. His face is all sweaty, and his lips are moving, but I can’t hear him saying anything.

I turn around and head for the stairs. The kitchen doesn’t sound so bad anymore, and I can wait for everyone there. Aaron probably wants to be alone anyway. Maybe Mya needs something to eat. And where is Mya anyway?

I’m almost to the first step when I hear Mr. Peterson make a kind of hiccupping sound.

“No,” he whispers.

I lean back and try to see his face in the mirror, but I can’t see anything from the stairs. I slink toward his room again, shoving aside the dread that’s creeping in.

I stand where I did before, and now Mr. Peterson is holding his face like it hurts, except he looks like he’s the one hurting it because he’s pressing and squeezing so hard, his skin is turning pink and his eyes are bulging.

“No, please,” he says, and it sounds like anguish, like begging. “Please just … stop!”

I open my mouth to say something. Is this what it looks like when someone has a stroke? Or an aneurysm? Or a meltdown? I turn toward the stairs, regretting more than ever saying whatever it was I said to anger Mya the other night. Their dad needs help—I need to flag someone down without disturbing him, but everyone’s migrated out of the living room.

Then I hear a kind of squeal, and the first thing I think of is a mouse we found in the attic of the red house once, but the squeal turns into a hoarse cry, and I realize that Mr. Peterson is trying to scream.

I spin around to see what it is Mr. Peterson can’t seem to stop seeing, and suddenly his face has gone slack, his hands limp and useless at his sides. His face is splotched red from where he squeezed it, but his eyes are half-closed, his gaze unfocused.

I’m about to bolt for the stairs to get help when a flash of white in the corner of my eye catches my attention. Aaron is there, standing at the end of the hall, his white shirt untucked, his tie perfectly in place. He’s staring hard at me, like he’s trying to see right through me, and for the first time ever, I have no idea what to say to him.

“I think your dad’s …”

I want him to finish my sentence, but he just stares at me.

I try again. “I don’t think he’s … uh … himself.”

Aaron doesn’t smile, but his eyes squint a little. I expect him to at least be worried, but he just stands there.

Then he says, “Really? He seems perfectly fine to me.”

I take a few steps closer to Aaron.

“Are … are you okay?”

He laughs a joyless laugh, his eyes no longer squinting. “Yeah. I’m on top of the world. Why do you ask?”

“I’m sorry … it’s just, I don’t really know what to say,” I stumble through my explanation. He’s obviously upset. How could he not be?

“It, uh, it was a nice service. I mean, you said some nice things,” I mutter, and maybe this is why people say such stupid things after funerals. It’s impossible to come up with the right words. Still, Aaron isn’t making it very easy. We were hardly hanging out before his mom died. Now the accident. And there was that thing with …

“Do you know where Mya is?” I ask him, and Aaron goes silent. He’s so still, I think maybe he’s figured out how to turn himself to stone.

Finally, he says, “Why are you looking for Mya?”

I take another step closer because the glare from the window in the hallway is casting a weird shadow on his face.

“I guess I just want to make sure she’s okay. I mean, as okay as she can be.”

“Mya’s …” he starts to say, then swallows, and now I’m close to panic. What if she never made it home the other night?

“If there’s something going on … I mean, of course there’s something going on. But if there was something going on, you know, before, you can tell me.”

Aaron straightens his head, and his face is back in shadow. I don’t want to go any closer to him, though.

“Trust me, Nicky,” he says. “You don’t want to hear it.”

I hear a creak behind me, and the floorboard under me lifts the tiniest bit. I spin around to find Mr. Peterson standing a foot away. His face is still splotched pink from the pressure he applied to it.

I jump back before I can stop myself. It’s just that I forgot he was even there.

“Tell everyone it’s time to go home, Aaron,” Mr. Peterson says, his voice flat and emotionless. Then he returns to his room, this time closing the door behind him.

When I turn back to Aaron, for the briefest second, I recognize the person looking back at me. His eyes are rimmed red, and his Adam’s apple travels up and down his neck as he chokes something back.

But his voice is as emotionless as his dad’s. “Time to go home.”

I don’t wait for him to tell me twice. It’s not just a hint anymore. He’s telling me in no uncertain terms he’s got enough going on to deal with any of the drama I bring. Maybe two kids with a bunch of missing pieces don’t make each other whole—the perfect machine with all its parts in place. Maybe they just empty each other out more.

I’m halfway down the stairs before I hear him say, “And, Nicky … don’t come back.”