“I take it she’s your police escort?” Abby asked, eyes wide with fascination.

“Yeah.” Dan didn’t need to look over his shoulder to know Officer Coates—that was her name—was standing three feet behind him.

“So what happened last night?” Jordan asked. Morning light streamed in through the cafeteria windows over his shoulder. The line for pancakes was usually out the door, but it was significantly shorter today. Almost a third of the program’s students were gone. “I mean, after you texted me.”

“I didn’t text you,” Dan replied automatically. Thinking hurt. He’d hardly slept. His head was stuffed with sleepy wool. He choked down a second cup of coffee and waved to Officer Coates. She rolled her eyes.

“I’m lost,” Abby admitted, holding up a hand. “Did he text you or not?”

“Jordan got a message from me, it was in my phone, but I can’t remember sending it . . . because I didn’t.” It sounded ridiculous enough that he didn’t blame Abby for her skepticism.

“Nope,” she said. “Still lost.”

“Me, too.” Dan forked his pancake apart into three pieces and scooted them around in the lake of syrup on his plate. He wanted food to taste good again. He wanted life to make sense again. “Anyway, the same thing happened but with Felix. I don’t want to go into it. . . . The whole thing’s a gigantic mess.”

“You don’t want to go into it? But there’s a cop following you around. You don’t think that might warrant a bit of explanation?” Abby watched him intently from across the table.

Dan knew that he hadn’t been fully forthright with them about things. He was no longer entirely sure why. As much as he liked the idea of having best friends with whom he could share anything, it was like all he knew how to be was alone, apart.

“Maybe your phone is haunted,” Jordan said bitingly. “Maybe we should perform an exorcism.”

“Don’t worry,” Abby cut in. “This is all just a misunderstanding, I’m sure of it.”

I wish I was so sure.

“Ha! Dan, not worry?” Jordan cackled. “You’re better off telling a duck not to quack.”

“Thanks, you two. You always know how to make me feel better.”

After breakfast, Dan walked to class with his friends, with Officer Coates following ten feet back.

“What do they think I’ll do?” Dan wondered aloud. “Run? Where would I go?”

“It does feel a little excessive,” Abby agreed, glancing back at their tail. “At least she’s giving you space. I’m sure it could be worse.”

Dan appreciated that Abby was determined to find the silver lining in everything that morning; he needed a dose of her optimism in his life. They split up when they reached the academic buildings, Jordan heading to one of his math classes while Abby walked off to the art building.

Dan wasn’t prepared for the humiliation of attending class with an armed escort. Officer Coates waited outside his classroom, but even so, he felt the burn of accusing eyes on him. The remaining students pointed and whispered with zero subtlety. Dan could do nothing but put his head down, take notes, and try not to burst into flames from the embarrassment of it all. It didn’t help when he got passed a note that said, “Go home psycho.”

Halfway through the lecture, Dan lost all ability to concentrate. He listened, not really understanding the words, and his hand continued to move, but he had no idea what he was writing.

When class was over, Dan looked down at his notes and bit back the urge to shout. The last few sentences weren’t in his normal script, but he recognized the looping penmanship immediately. The warden’s. It wasn’t enough that the warden was in his head; now he was in his body, too. He collected his things at lightning speed and ran out the door. If he didn’t get some fresh air, he was going to be sick.

Officer Coates stood in the sunshine waiting, and two other officers, including Teague, stood with her. Chatting with the police were the last two people on earth he expected to see.

“Mom? Dad?” Dan hugged his backpack to his chest.

“Sweetheart!” His mother ran over and wrapped him in her arms. He was surprised by how good the hug felt, and he actually had a hard time letting go. Part of him wanted to cry.

“You’re okay,” Sandy said, hugging him harder. “You’re okay, you’re okay.”

“It’s good to see you, Mom,” he said.

“Let’s take this inside.” Teague motioned toward the admissions building down the path. “We should have this conversation in private.”

This was the moment Dan had been dreading since last night. His parents walked him north up the hill, the officers following a few steps in their wake. Dan couldn’t seem to stop shaking. It didn’t matter that he believed his own innocence, it would be impossible to convince anyone else once they found out how messed up he was. . . .

“You just tell us if we need to call a lawyer, kiddo,” his father whispered to him. They were right outside the admissions building now.

Dan frowned. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”

“Inside, please, if you’ll follow me,” Teague said, charging ahead.

Dan hadn’t been inside the admissions building before. It had that venerated old college feeling, with a high ceiling and slender windows and wood paneling on everything. In the front hall was a leather couch and an antique chair. Dan imagined anxious students waiting here, hoping that their college interviews went well. College seemed like a petty concern at the moment.

The police escorted them past the waiting area to a small room on the right. Teague and his parents went first, with Dan bringing up the rear. Officer Coates and another cop waited outside the door.

He was now shaking so bad he could hardly sit down without knocking over the chair.

“Okay, let’s have a chat about last night. Why don’t you start from the beginning,” Teague prompted.

His parents and the officer sat on one side of a conference table, all facing Dan. It felt like an inquisition.

Dan told the story about his searching for Felix and finding the man with the crowbar. When he described the man pinning him to the ground, he thought his mother was going to faint. Finally, he got to the part where the cops had barged in and started accusing him of the worst.

“The thing is, I really don’t remember sending those messages. I know they’re in my phone, I know that, and I know it sounds ridiculous, but I swear: I didn’t write those texts.”

His parents shared a worried look, and his father cleared his throat.

“Officer, I don’t want you to take this the wrong way,” his father began gravely, “but what you have to understand is, Dan has always had, shall we say, difficulties. He came to us from the foster system after he’d already lived in a few other places. He’s been a great kid since then, I don’t want you to misunderstand me, but, well, he’s always needed a little extra attention. A few trips to a psychologist . . .”

“Therapist,” his mother corrected.

“Therapist,” his father agreed.

The officer nodded along with the story. Dan hated talking about this stuff with his parents at all, but in the presence of someone else, a cop? It was embarrassing, frankly, and in this case, incriminating. Teague glanced at him from time to time, and he could swear he saw the officer’s jaw setting by degrees, getting stiffer as Dan’s guilt solidified in his mind.

“His therapist tells us he has some issues with memory—”

“Mild dissociative disorder,” Sandy cut in.

“But that they don’t pose any problem for him having a normal, healthy life. He’s not a dangerous kid, Officer. If he sent some text message to his buddy and then forgot about it, I’m sure it was meant to be totally harmless.”

Dan gripped the chair, struggling to look calm. How bad would it be if he blacked out right then and there?

That unreliable memory of his . . . How could he tell his parents that it had gotten much, much worse, in just a matter of weeks? That maybe he wasn’t completely harmless?

“Now Mr. and Mrs. Harold, I can’t help noticing that Dan doesn’t share your last name. Why is that?”

His parents exchanged another look. Dan wanted to sink into the floor and die.

“Well, Crawford is the name he came to us with,” his father said.

“We gave him the choice, just like our social worker said we could,” his mother said defensively. “Dan had already lived with so many families by that point. I think he just wanted to keep one thing the same—one piece of himself.”

“Hm,” Teague said. He turned to address Dan directly. “Are you aware that you have the exact same name as the last warden of Brookline asylum?”

Dan nodded. “I read about him recently, yeah.”

His parents, bless their hearts, said nothing. He had asked them about it on the phone, but now they kept silent, perhaps sensing, as Dan did, that Teague saw the strange connection as some sort of proof of his guilt.

“It’s not that unusual of a last name,” his father said. “And lord knows Daniel is common enough.”

“But what about Dan’s birth parents?” Teague asked, finally looking away from Dan. “There must be a quick way to check if there’s any relation.”

“I’m afraid it’s anything but quick,” his mother admitted. “We don’t get to see that kind of information at all, and you’d need a court order to get it yourselves. But I can’t see why it’s so important. So what if Danny was related to this warden? What does that prove?”

“You don’t think it’s a rather alarming coincidence?”

“I think a coincidence is exactly what it is, and that’s my whole point,” his mother said testily.

Dan hated to see his parents get angry, even if it was helping his case.

“Did the . . .” His mouth had suddenly gone so dry it was hard to speak. “Did the guy who killed Joe ever confess?”

Teague stared, taken aback. “Actually, no, he didn’t. He insists it was a wrong place, wrong time sort of thing. Still, he had the victim’s possessions and a murder weapon on him and he can’t explain that.” Teague snorted, giving Dan a look that said, “Lucky you.” The officer leaned an elbow on the desk between them. His brow lowered and Dan knew he should have kept his mouth shut. “Why do you ask?”

“Just . . . curious.” Dan hoped he could keep it together for a few more minutes. He felt like if he didn’t get to the bottom of this mystery now, it would plague him for the rest of his life.

It was Thursday. There were now ten days till the end of the program. “I want to finish out the program,” he said calmly.

“We’re not done questioning you yet,” Teague replied, tugging his mustache. “How you answer those questions will determine whether you get to stay or not.”

“Fair enough,” Dan said.

His father looked ready to argue, but his mother nodded. “We’ll stay in town, Danny. Just in case.”

Dan couldn’t fully explain why he wanted, needed, to finish this program, when there were so many reasons why he should run far, far away, as fast as he could.

Dan ending up at Brookline this summer wasn’t a coincidence, it was a connection. And he was going to leave Brookline cured if it killed him.