CHAPTER

Eight

JULIE

At the end of her shift on Friday, Julie calls up Mr. Vickery, the man in charge of the committee that deals with the monsters and the treaties. She put her report in about what had happened at Claire’s house a few days ago and never heard anything back. She knows they can be slow, but someone’s life could be in danger here. Claire’s life, in particular. They’ve been talking pretty much every day since they hung out watching movies at Julie’s place, and Julie has dreams of playing the hero, sweeping Claire off her feet like in those romance novels Julie’s mom is always reading. Not that a phone call is nearly so exciting.

The line rings a couple of times and then Mr. Vickery himself picks up—Julie stole his direct number out of her dad’s address book.

“Mr. Vickery?” she says, hoping she sounds like an adult.

“Yes? Who is this?”

“My name is Julie Alvarez. I’m Victor Alvarez’s daughter.”

“Ahhh.” His voice softens. “Yes, little Julie.”

Julie scowls at that.

“How’s your mother?”

“She’s fine. I was calling about the report—”

“Yes, I received it. Troublesome stuff.” He doesn’t sound troubled. “Have there been any other issues? Any—” Papers shuffle on the other side of the line. “Have there been any deaths or injuries since you filed it?”

“No.” Julie twines the phone cord around her finger, irritated and impatient. “I just wanted to see what you were going to do about it. Before someone gets hurt.”

More shuffling. It sounds like static.

“Well, Julie, the committee’s looking into it. These things take time.”

“Take time! The monsters are violating the treaties and coming into town.”

“I realize that. But unless there’s proof of a serious, immediate threat to a human, we prefer to keep our distance. I’m sure you’re aware of the delicacy of our situation here in Indianola. There aren’t really any precedents for things like this, you know. And we’ve found that keeping us separate from them is the wisest course of action.”

Julie glowers. She’s heard this tone of voice before—from her father. It’s his politician’s voice, the one he uses when he’s trying to let her down gently. So she knows what Mr. Vickery is saying. They aren’t going to do a damn thing.

She thanks him and hangs up the phone. The clock on the wall clicks over to six o’clock. Quitting time. Julie sighs. Claire can’t hang out today and she doesn’t feel like going home, doesn’t feel like sitting up in the attic staring at a TV screen and marinating in her own thoughts. Maybe Lawrence is home. He doesn’t usually work in the evenings, and she’s been meaning to talk to him anyway. She wants to know what the hell’s going on with Audrey.

Julie leaps out of her chair, not bothering to tidy the scatter of papers strewn across the desk. She goes across the hall to the break room and clocks out. Out front Forrest is leaning over Brittany’s desk, trying to flirt. Julie ignores both of them and steps out into the hot, steamy evening.

She picks up a hamburger for herself and a blended Coke float for Lawrence—it’s his favorite and a tried-and-true bribery item—at the K&L Root Beer Drive-in. Then she speeds through town so her food doesn’t get cold.

Since Lawrence still lives with his mom, his house doesn’t look like he belongs there, with its pale blue siding and the rosemary and jasmine growing along the porch. But Julie knows that Lawrence sticks around because Aunt Rosa has a lot of health problems, and he doesn’t want her to be alone. His dad fled the picture years ago, and when his mom reverted to her maiden name, Reyes, Lawrence changed his last name to match.

Julie rings the doorbell. The porch looks the same as it has since she was a little girl and used to come over here on Sunday afternoons. She hopes Lawrence is actually home, and not out on some creepy date.

Footsteps shuffle around inside the house, and then the door opens. Lawrence peers out through the screen.

“What are you doing here?” he asks in a whisper.

Julie holds up the blended float. “Wanna hang out?”

“Is that from K&L?”

“Sure is.”

Lawrence slides the screen door open. “Mom’s sleeping,” he says. “So you need to be quiet.”

“I’m always quiet,” Julie whispers. “Besides, I don’t want to stay in the house. I thought we could go shoot targets out back, like we did when we were kids.” She pauses, grinning. “Unless you had other plans.”

Lawrence rubs at his forehead. He seems a lot older than nineteen. “Why would I have other plans?” He’s trying to play it cool and failing.

Julie just shrugs, though, and steps past him, handing him the blended float. The house is quiet and neat like always. Lawrence keeps it clean. She plops down at the kitchen table and eats her hamburger while Lawrence lurks over by the refrigerator, slurping at his float.

“Haven’t seen much of you lately,” he says.

“Haven’t seen much of you lately.”

Lawrence doesn’t meet her eye. “I’ve been working.”

“That what the kids call it these days?”

“You’d know. You’re the kid.”

Julie shoots him an irritated look, then takes a bite out of her hamburger. “Fine. I’ll go first. I’ve been hanging out with Mrs. Sudek’s granddaughter. Claire.”

“Mmm.” He pauses. “Be careful.”

“Be careful with what? We’re just friends.” She doesn’t look at him, though. “You’re the one that needs to be careful, if you’re seeing Audrey.”

“I just don’t want you to get all heartbroken again.”

Julie takes another bite of her hamburger. He certainly knows how to weasel out of a conversation. She knows he’s thinking about what happened with Kimberly Diaz last year. To be fair, it was an emotional disaster of epic proportions. But Julie’s managed to get over it, mostly, and besides, Claire is different. She’s from the big city.

“It’s your turn,” Julie says. “What’s been keeping you busy?”

Lawrence shrugs “Pretty sure you know.”

“Oh come on! Since when do we keep secrets from each other?” Julie tosses a wayward tomato onto the burger wrapping. “Audrey Duchesne? Really?”

Lawrence scowls. “Yes, really. Why’s it so surprising?”

“Because you’re a nerd and she’s a cheerleader.”

Lawrence rolls his eyes.

“Seriously, what’s going on? Did you ask her out?”

Lawrence hesitates. Takes a drink from his float. Then he sighs and sits down at the table with her. “She asked me out, actually. The day after we saw her at the arcade. Just—called me up, out of the blue.”

A chill crawls down Julie’s spine. “How’d she get your number?”

“Same way anyone else would. It’s listed.” He leans back in his chair. “Are you jealous or something?”

Julie makes a gagging noise. “Of you? Hell no. Audrey is—she creeps me out, is all.”

“The grunge girl hates the cheerleader. You’re such a cliche´.”

“Don’t call me a cliche´. And I didn’t say I hate her. I said she creeps me out.”

“And why exactly does she creep you out?”

Julie falls silent. She chews her hamburger. Lawrence stares at her from across the table. It’s true, she can’t say why; only that something seems, well, wrong with her.

“I think she’s just trying to play you,” Julie finally says. “So you won’t bust her drinking at the Stargazer’s Masquerade this year.”

Lawrence laughs and shakes his head. “I can take care of myself, Julie.” He swirls his float with his straw. “So how’s work?”

There he goes, changing the subject. She lets him, though. She doesn’t want to talk about Audrey anymore.

“Another monster came by Claire’s house.” She pauses to grab a couple of fries. “I really think something’s going on. The committee’s not doing anything about it, though. Typical.”

“The monsters don’t hurt people unprovoked,” Lawrence says. “There’s no reason they’d start now.”

Julie finishes up her hamburger and wipes the grease from her fingers. “Yeah, yeah, I know.” She looks up at Lawrence. “So, target practice? I bet you need it, for cop school.”

Lawrence keeps sitting there, looking annoyed.

“It’ll be fun,” Julie says. She doesn’t add that she thinks the concentration will help distract her from thinking about Audrey, or about the monsters, or about Claire and the idea that their scents intertwine in a cosmically interesting way. What the hell does that even mean?

“I don’t want to wake Mom up.”

“What? Because of the gunshots? You know it’s like a ten-minute hike down to the target spot.”

“Fine.” Lawrence gives a sigh of defeat. Just like an old man. Yeah, Audrey’s definitely using him for boozing purposes.

Julie grins. “Excellent! Go get the guns. I’ll meet you round back.” She balls up the wrapping from her hamburger and tosses it in the garbage. Lawrence disappears into the mysterious fathoms of the house and Julie goes out onto the back porch. Even though it’s late in the day, the sun hasn’t set, which means the air is still hot. At least the target spot is shady.

She plops down on the wooden swing that Aunt Rosa keeps out on the porch as she waits for Lawrence. Another relic from her childhood. She used to try to flip over the top when she was a little girl, but Lawrence always hated that swing. His father made it for his mom during one of his sober periods, and Julie understands now that Lawrence dismisses it as a bribe. Which it probably was.

The back door opens. Lawrence steps out with a rifle and a box of bullets and two pairs of safety goggles. His cop gun is tucked into the holster he wears with his uniform. Dork.

“Can I shoot your pistol?” Julie asks immediately.

“Absolutely not.” Lawrence hands her the rifle. “You’re familiar with this one. I don’t want any accidents.”

Julie pretends to be annoyed, making a big show of hemming and hawing. But really, it’s part of the tradition of target practice. Lawrence always has to stick to the rules. It’s comforting that even if he’s dating Audrey, that much hasn’t changed.

They step off the porch and head to the back of Lawrence’s property. This house has been in his family for ages, on his father’s side, and so even though Aunt Rosa raised Lawrence here more or less by herself, really the house and land and everything belong to Lawrence. Which is kind of weird, because even though he gave up the deed, Lawrence’s dad is still alive. Uncle Randy. Julie doesn’t know him, just has a vague memory of a tall, rangy white guy smoking cigarettes on the back porch, the silver glint of a beer can always within arm’s reach.

She’s pretty sure Lawrence’s obsession with rules is part of his quest to become an inverted image of his father: His father’s the negative, he’s the photograph.

A breeze picks up and rustles around the trees. The path leading down to the target is really just a strip of worn-away grass, nothing official. Julie’s been coming down here as long as she can remember. It’s her one concession to growing up in a redneck town like Indianola. She might refuse to do stock shows or wear cowboy boots, but she’ll shoot a gun at an empty Coke can.

“Do you really think the committee’s not going to do anything about that monster coming into town?”

Julie glances over at Lawrence in surprise. “You’re the one who says not to worry.”

Lawrence shrugs. “I don’t think the monsters are going to hurt anyone. But I don’t like the committee just sitting on their hands either. We can’t just let a treaty violation slide.”

It’s nice to know that Lawrence agrees with her on something for once, even if it probably is just because he loves rules.

They keep walking until the trees clear out and reveal the big dirt backstop Lawrence installed during one of his fits of safety obsession. Julie remembers him backing his truck up to the tree line and piling dirt into a wheelbarrow to cart it over. It seemed like a lot of work, but she knew he did it so stray bullets wouldn’t vanish into the woods.

The big metal box of targets sits in its usual place in front of the backstop. It’s been there long enough that grass has grown around it so that it look like an extension of the woods. Bits of broken glass sparkle in the sunlight. They’ve never kept real targets out here, just old glass bottles and aluminum cans that Lawrence rinses out and stores in plastic bags in his garage.

“I’ll set them up.” Julie leans her rifle up against a tree and bounds over to the box. The latch is nearly rusted away. She flips it open, pulls out five Coke bottles, closes the box, and lines them up in a row. When she turns around, Lawrence is loading his gun, the muzzle pointed toward the trees. She goes over beside him.

“I haven’t been out here in a long time,” Lawrence says. “They have an actual shooting range down at the station.”

“Oh yeah? Has your aim gotten any better?”

Lawrence gives her an annoyed look. “Actually, yes, it has.”

Julie grins. “You go first, then. Let’s see what you got.”

“Put on your eye protection.”

Julie makes a face at him, but she does as he asks, and when he hands her a pair of earplugs, she puts those in too. She knows from experience it’s not worth arguing with him about it.

Lawrence lines up his gun and fires off five shots, one after another. Three of the bottles explode, shimmering in the sunlight.

“Damn,” Lawrence says.

“Ha! Brutal. I bet I can get them.” Julie grabs the rifle and loads it and lines up her shot. It’s been forever since she’d last come out here, but the motions come to her like a sense memory. She pulls back the bolt and squeezes the trigger. The rifle’s explosion sets her ears to ringing, but at least the bottle’s nothing but bits of fragmented sunlight in the grass.

“Got it!” she shouts.

“Yeah, I can see that.” Lawrence doesn’t sound too impressed.

Julie lines up and takes her next shot. The last bottle tips off the chest and rolls a few feet before stopping, unharmed.

“That counts.” Julie straightens up.

“Hardly. Set your gun down.”

Julie smirks at him but does as he says. Lawrence walks up to the box and picks up the bottle Julie missed as well as an assortment of Coke cans and lines them all up. Over the muffle of her earplugs Julie can make out the chattering whine of cicadas up in the trees and the distant buzzing of grasshoppers. The sounds of heat, the sounds she’s always associated with this place.

“So tell me more about this thing with Claire.”

Julie goes still. “There’s no thing,” she says. “We’re friends.”

Lawrence pulls his gun out of its holster and looks over at her. “You said that. I was asking about the thing with the monsters.”

He fires off three shots and three Coke cans go flying off into the dirt.

“Aren’t you going to shoot at the rest of those?”

“Figured I’d leave them for you.”

Julie picks up her rifle and peers through the scope. “They keep showing up at her house. Twice now, like I said.” Bang. She misses completely. “The last one, it was saying something about astronauts.”

“Astronauts?”

Julie looks through the scope again. The Coke cans loom distorted and huge in front of her, glittering in the sunlight. Everything feels distorted lately. “And it said me and Claire are cosmically interesting.”

Bang. She fires before she’s ready, so she has a few deafening seconds to prepare for Lawrence’s reaction to that statement. Figures that she actually gets that last bottle. Glass sparkles everywhere. She puts her rifle down, staring straight ahead.

“Cosmically interesting,” Lawrence says.

“Yeah.” She keeps squinting out at the dappled sunlight. It’s peaceful out here, quiet when the guns aren’t going off, and Julie remembers how Lawrence called it a sanctuary once, a place where he could escape his father. Maybe that’s why she works up the nerve to tell him the whole story. “We also found a dress that probably belonged to one of her relatives in the attic.”

“How could you possibly know that?” Lawrence asks.

Julie looks over at him. “There was a name on the box,” she says. “Abigail Sudek.”

He stares at her with his annoying cop’s intensity and she looks away, her cheeks burning.

“Sounds like a mystery,” he says at last.

“Yeah, you’d like that, wouldn’t you?” She glances over at him again. “What with wanting to be a detective and all?”

Lawrence doesn’t say anything, just hoists his gun and fires off a couple of shots. Both of the remaining Coke cans fly up into the air. One of them disappears into the trees.

“Nice,” Julie says. She slips on her rifle’s safety and leans it up against a nearby tree. The cicadas whine louder, their chattering song rising and falling. “It’s just weird,” she says, “that we seem to have this connection.”

“You think it’s some kind of sign of true love?” Lawrence pretends to inspect his gun.

“Don’t make fun of me. Not when you’re taking freaking Audrey Duchesne out for pizza.” Julie sighs. “Apparently Mrs. Sudek claims the Sudeks used to own my house. Like a hundred years ago or something. Which is weird. I thought our family built it.”

Lawrence looks up at her, his brow creased. “Yeah, okay, that is a little weird. But you know you can probably research this, if the family names go back this far.”

“What are you talking about?”

Lawrence shakes his head. “Surprise. I say the word research and you completely shut down.”

“Shut up.”

“I mean that your parents have enough crap shoved in the attic, there are probably some old deeds up there. If the Sudeks really did own the house back in the day, that would prove it.” He shrugs. “Dunno why your parents would lie about it, though.”

“Maybe they had a feud.” Julie grins. “You know, Lawrence, sometimes you don’t have terrible ideas.”

“If you want to dig around in old boxes, have fun.”

Julie hardly hears him, though. A feud would make sense. Maybe that’s why she and Claire are cosmically interesting.

She can’t wait to call Claire with her latest hypothesis.

Julie calls Claire as soon as she gets back home, her heart thrumming. But when the phone clicks on, it’s Mrs. Sudek’s voice on the other end.

“Oh,” Julie says. “Hello. I’m calling for Claire.”

The line goes quiet save for the weird crackle that you hear on all Indianola phones.

“Who is this?” Mrs. Sudek snaps. “Audrey, that’s not you, is it?”

Audrey? “Um, no, it’s Julie, from the—”

“Claire can’t go out,” Mrs. Sudek says. “She’s doing chores.”

And then the line goes dead. Julie groans and tosses the phone on her bed. She was so excited to have another reason to see Claire—and one that had nothing to do with monsters. Now she doesn’t know what to do with herself.

She flings herself back on her bed, beside her phone. She hates her bedroom, with all its pretentious Victorian furniture, all picked out by her mom’s decorator. The only place she was allowed to add her own touch, as the decorator put it, was inside the closet, and Julie lined the walls with posters from her favorite bands, X and Bikini Kill and Heavens to Betsy. A little bit of the twentieth century hidden away behind closed doors.

She suspects the decoration issue was part of the reason her parents gave her free run of the attic, even if they said it was because they didn’t want her hogging the TV. She’ll give them credit for that much.

The attic is Julie’s space through and through, and that’s why she goes up there now even though she’s not in the mood to play SNES or watch movies. She can’t think in her bedroom. In the attic, she can. It’s like being inside her own head, instead of her mother’s.

She switches on the light, grabs a Coke out of the mini-fridge tucked in the corner, and sprawls across her couch. A distorted version of her reflection appears in the blank TV, her chin swelling out to hideous proportions. No wonder Claire doesn’t like her except as a friend.

Julie sighs and settles down into the couch’s worn cushions. She drops her head over the armrest so she can look at the attic upside down, something she used to do as a kid. From here she’s got a perfect view of the mirror, the gray dress still obscuring the reflection.

So Mrs. Sudek is being a jerk. That doesn’t mean Claire doesn’t want to see Julie. Still, doubt worms its way into Julie’s thoughts. Why did Mrs. Sudek think she was Audrey? Claire doesn’t even seem to like Audrey that much—

Enough. Julie knows she needs to distract herself. She can find the deeds herself, see if there’s anything to Mrs. Sudek’s claims.

She swings down from the couch and goes over to the old dollhouse, still hanging open from when they found the box with the dress. She stands with her weight on one foot, drinking her Coke, appraising the stacks of old junk. Even though Julie claimed the attic as her own, she never really went through any of the stuff that gathers dust up here. She just shoved it out of the way so she could set up her TV. All she knows is that this is stuff that’s been here since forever—most of her family’s Christmas decorations and other seasonal things are stored out in the shed.

She has no idea where to start.

Finally, Julie closes her eyes, spins around twice, and jabs her finger out at the stacks. When she opens her eyes, she decides she’s pointing at the third box in a stack half-hidden behind an old wooden chest.

It takes her a few minutes to drag the box out of the mess, and by the time she’s through, she’s coughing and hacking in the clouds of dust. She drops the box on the floor and something clanks inside it. Julie cringes and hopes she didn’t break anything.

She kneels down and slides the lid away, half holding her breath—but inside there’s only a tangle of candlesticks and silverware, all black with tarnish. Julie extracts a fork and rubs it against her shirt. She manages to clear a bit of the tarnish away, enough to see the silver underneath. Real silver, she supposes, since it tarnished.

She slides the box aside and selects another. This one is full of old clothes, dresses and blouses and things from the thirties. The next box is so heavy that Julie almost collapses under its weight; she lets it drop and then pushes it over to the investigation spot. Inside, she finds several thick leather-bound books. They look old. A hundred years old, even.

Her heart skips a beat.

She pulls one out and opens it. The page is filled with rows of writing, all in the same spidery, old-fashioned script. Across the top someone has written Register of Mr. Javier Alvarez, the Alvarez Motel.

The Alvarez Motel. The first stake in the Alvarez empire. She’s heard this story before, about how her great-great-grandfather bought the Alvarez Motel with his last fifty dollars. Her father told her when she was a little girl, trying to get her interested in the family business.

She runs her finger down the columns of text. Dates, numbers, names, amounts. Financial records. These are financial records of the Alvarez Hotel, all dated back to June 1901.

“Getting closer,” she murmurs.

Julie quickly flips through the four remaining ledgers, checking first the dates, then the names, to see if she can find any clues. All the dates are for the first few years of the twentieth century, and there’s no mention of the Sudeks.

Then, in the last ledger, as she’s flipping through the pages, a photograph falls out.

Julie stops for a moment, still clutching the book. The photograph fell facedown, and there’s something written across the back, in the same spidery handwriting as the ledger.

Abigail, 1892.

Julie glances over at the dress. The same Abigail?

Slowly, she turns the photograph over. It shows a young woman with fair hair and large dark eyes, a corseted waist, and a high-necked dress. She’s standing outside, beneath a palm tree, a house filling up the background.

Julie’s house.

Julie flips the photo back over. It still reads Abigail, 1892.

Hardly proof that the Sudeks used to own the house, though.

She looks at the woman again, studying her features closely, trying to find some hint of Claire in them. There is something about the shape of the woman’s mouth, the upward slope of her eyes, that suggests Claire, suggests that the two could be related.

Julie sets the photograph aside and riffles through the ledgers, trying to find something she missed. There’s nothing. She stacks them back in their box and goes over to where she found them originally, and picks up the two closest boxes. One contains some broken china and a crumple of silk handkerchiefs. The other contains little decoupage boxes, a jar of perfume, and knickknacks wrapped up in strips of muslin. Julie lifts each item out and lines them up on the floor.

At the very bottom of the box, tucked underneath a larger piece of that patterned muslin, is a bundle of letters.

Julie picks it up at the edges. The paper is old and thin and yellowed, and the writing on the front is faded, although not so much that Julie can’t read it.

The top letter is addressed to Javier Alvarez.

She flips through the stack. All of the letters are addressed to Javier, and all in the same slanted, neat handwriting, although none of them list an address or include a stamp. Julie pulls one of the letters out of its envelope. It’s addressed formally, Dear Mr. Alvarez. Julie skips to the name at the bottom.

Abigail Sudek.

Julie parks her car two houses down from Mrs. Sudek’s. It’s almost midnight, and she doesn’t want to take any unnecessary risks.

She drags out her backpack, stuffed with the letters, the photograph, and a flashlight, and slings it across one shoulder. Claire’s street is quiet and empty, the sea wind whistling forlornly through the trees. It’s late enough that the day’s heat has evaporated a little, and it’s almost pleasant out here in the silvery starlight.

She walks over to Claire’s house. All the lights are off, and the house looks like it’s been abandoned to the shadows. This is going to be the hard part. Julie’s not entirely sure which window is Claire’s. Fortunately, she’s been in houses in this neighborhood that have the same layout, and she’s pretty sure the master bedroom—Mrs. Sudek’s—is in the back.

Pretty sure.

Julie goes up to the first window and taps lightly on the screen, then jumps out of the way, pressing herself against the wall and peering over to the side to get a glimpse of whoever looks out. No one does. She knocks on the screen again. Same thing.

She takes a deep breath and goes over to the next window and tries the same thing, although she knocks a little harder, enough that the screen rattles in the frame. This time, a light switches on, and Julie’s heart starts thumping against her chest. She presses against the brick and waits.

Nothing happens. The light’s still on, a little bright spot behind the blinds.

Julie knocks again.

A second passes. The blinds split open. Julie sees a flash of Claire’s eye.

She leaps in front of the window and waves.

Claire blinks, then pulls up the blinds. Julie waves again, her breath in her throat.

Claire smiles and waves back. Her hair is mussed from sleep and she has on an old tank top with her pajama bottoms. She looks completely adorable. Julie’s heart sighs.

Claire pulls up the window a couple of inches and bends down to speak through the crack. “What are you doing here?” she whispers.

“I tried to call,” Julie whispers back. “But your grandmother said you were busy. I figured—”

“She was lying?” Claire smiles. “She totally was, I’ve been bored all day.” Then she glances over her shoulder. “I’m not sure it’s the best idea—”

“I found something.” Julie holds up her backpack. She doesn’t want to say goodbye to Claire, not right now. “Letters from Abigail Sudek.”

Claire’s eyes go wide. “The same name as the dress!” she whispers.

“Yep. She wrote them to someone named”—Julie pauses dramatically—“Javier Alvarez. Who I know for a fact is my great-great-
grandfather.”

“Oh, wow, really?” She glances around her room, then back at Julie. “Wait there. I’ll be out in a minute.”

Julie nods. Claire closes the window and the blinds and Julie sits down in the grass beside the house, the backpack resting on top of her knees. The night sings around her. It’s all very romantic.

She knows she shouldn’t think that way.

A few minutes later, Claire skitters around the side of the house. She’s changed out of her pajamas and into a fluorescent pink tank top and a pair of shorts, although she’s barefoot.

“Where’s your car?” she asks, still whispering.

“Down the street. I didn’t want her to hear me in the driveway. Where’s a good place to talk?”

“That side of the house. It’s the complete opposite end from where her bedroom is.” Claire points in the direction she appeared. “And no one can see us from the street.”

Julie’s not particularly worried about random passersby spotting them outside, but she figures it’s better to be safe than sorry. She stands up and follows Claire over to the side of the house. Claire keeps glancing back over her shoulder, and smiling, and looking like she’s having the greatest time.

A warmth spreads through Julie’s stomach, up into her chest.

The side of the house is lined with big oleander bushes, but they find a clean spot of grass where Julie can lay out all her discoveries. She pulls everything out and lines it up on the backpack, then switches on the flashlight and holds it on her shoulder.

“So what’d you find?” Claire asks. She picks up the photograph. “Oh my God, is this her?”

“That’s what it says on the back. I mean, I’m assuming it’s the same Abigail.”

Claire nods, transfixed.

“But the really cool thing is the letters,” Julie says, spreading them out on the grass. “So these are definitely from Abigail Sudek, you can see on the envelopes. But some of them say Abigail Garner on the return address, which is”—she shuffles through the letters until she finds one—“the same address as my house. Look!”

Claire picks up the envelope and squints down at it.

“The only thing I can’t figure out is why your family name has been Sudek instead of Garner, if this really is your relative.”

“Oh, I think I know the answer to that,” Claire says. “My mom, when she took my dad’s last name, caused this big scandal in my family. Supposedly the women in my family never took their husband’s name.”

“That’s kind of badass, actually.”

“I guess. But it looks like it didn’t start with Abigail.” She pauses for a moment. “So Abigail must have gotten married and moved into your old house. But she didn’t marry Javier. I thought the house was always in your family?”

“That’s what my parents said, but this was all happening a hundred years ago,” Julie says. “Check out the dates.”

“Eighteen ninety-three,” Claire reads.

“Right. So the house was definitely in my family by the twenties, because that’s when my grandmother was born, and she grew up there. But before?” Julie shrugs. “Anyway, none of this is even the interesting part.”

“What do you mean?” Claire leans in close to Julie, her features elongated in the glow of the flashlight.

“So I didn’t get to read through all of the letters,” Julie says. “I thought we could do that now. But I think Abigail and Javier were having an affair.”

Claire’s eyes widen. “Are you serious?”

Julie nods, grinning a little.

“What did they say? Like, was it a torrid affair—”

The excitement in Claire’s voice sends a thrill racing up Julie’s spine. “I didn’t get super far. You want to help me read?”

“Absolutely!”

“Okay, awesome.” Julie sets down the flashlight and divides the letters into two stacks. “Let’s divide and conquer.”

Claire grins. Then she scoots over beside Julie, so close their knees touch. Julie goes rigid all the way through, but Claire just opens up her first letter. “So we can share the light,” she says.

“Oh yeah. Of course.” Julie smiles, tries to act nonchalant. She holds the flashlight beam between them and Claire leans in close with her eyes on the letter, the light spangling in her eyes.

They read.

It’s peaceful, being out here in the balmy night, the only sounds the distant chirping of insects in the trees, and the rustle of century-old paper, and the quiet exhalation of Claire’s breath. Whenever they finish a letter, they set it in a neat stack on top of Julie’s backpack.

In the letters that Julie reads, it becomes clear that Abigail and Javier knew each other well. Somehow, they met. On the beach, at the grocer’s in town: It’s not clear from the letters. But one did woo the other, and Abigail began to write to Javier. The third letter explains that much. I told you I would write, and write I shall.

What Julie is able to glean from her reading is this: They were both living in Indianola at the time, Abigail in Julie’s house, Javier in the old row houses that used to be where the fish supply shop is now. In her letters, she tells him of her daily activities, how she lunched with Rose on Wednesday and saw Marjory’s new baby at Mass. At the end of every letter she answers questions he posed to her, and so Julie is left only with answers, flowery and obscure.

“You have to look at this,” Claire says, breaking the silence. “I think you’re totally right about the two of them having an affair.”

“Really?” Julie takes the letter from Claire.

“It’s at the bottom,” Claire says, “The second-to-last paragraph.”

Julie skims down, and then begins to read.

Marriage is an act of aggression. It’s war for a more civilized time. I don’t wish you to make the mistake of thinking I have any say in the matter of my impending marriage to Gregory Garner. It was a decision made by my parents, a stratagem to save the Sudek family that has nothing to do with love. I’ve come to understand love—that sort of love, the love between a man and a woman—only recently. As you know.

“You see?” Claire says. “The Sudek family? You’re totally right, the dress must have been hers before she married. And then this: Only come to understand love recently? As you know. She’s totally talking about Javier!”

“Yeah.” Julie stares down at the words. She can’t believe that her pet theory, born out of her own desire to be with a member of the Sudek family, actually has some weight.

“I’m going to set that one aside,” Claire says.

They go back to reading. The silence settles around them again, soft and romantic.

And then Julie reads the first letter with a return address from Abigail Garner, not Sudek.

I simply can’t not write to you, I’m afraid. I understand if you choose not to respond, but I assure you that Gregory will not be reading your missives. He’s simply too busy in the oilfields—why, he’s barely here most days! If I could have a letter from you, it would fill my hours with the warm memories of our time together.

It’s a risk that pays off—Javier clearly keeps writing to her. They don’t exchange declarations of love, but she does continue to tell him of her day-to-day life. Eventually, Julie notices a recurring name: Emmert.

I’m afraid Gregory has hired Mr. Emmert against my protestations. Yesterday he began work in our gardens, and I went out to ask him about the bougainvillea and the hibiscus, as a sort of test; don’t worry, I remembered your warning! He was quite knowledgeable, but I must say, I don’t care for him. He’s rather vulgar in dress and mannerisms and I find him untrustworthy—unsettling, really. I told Mr. Hemshaw to keep close watch on the silver whenever he was working. Only said it was a bit of women’s intuition, at which point Mr. Hemshaw nodded gravely and admitted he would never ignore such a thing. Amusing!

From what Julie can infer, Emmert was some sort of hired hand whom Javier knew and didn’t trust, although Abigail never says explicitly why that might be. She mentions him in passing, usually as a complaint—that he makes her uncomfortable, that she wishes Gregory would get rid of him, but that he hasn’t done anything yet that would justify having him dismissed.

Suddenly, Claire lets out a shout of delight, then immediately slaps her hand over her mouth.

“What is it?” Julie looks up at her, surprised.

“Oh my God,” Claire says. “Oh my God, listen to this.” She starts to read: “Whenever I hold Charlotte in my arms, I feel a deep, pervasive sadness. I love my daughter dearly, with all my heart, and yet I cannot bring myself to love Gregory as I should. My heart belongs to her, of course, but I must confess it also belongs to you, my dear Javier.”

“Are you kidding me?” Julie snatches the letter from Claire, scans over it wildly. “Dude!” she says. “This is like a soap opera.”

“I know! And check this out. It’s another letter, from about a month later.” Claire clears her throat. “My darling, your last missive brought me such joy. I could never abandon my daughter.” Julie watches Claire reading; her eyes are bright and glossy in the flashlight. “To know you would never ask that of me—my heart is overflowing with love for you.” She stops and sighs dreamily, pressing the letter to her chest. “So romantic.”

Julie smiles at her, tries not to think about her own forbidden feelings. “I can’t disagree,” she says, her heart tight.

They keep reading, the night silken around them. Julie keeps glancing up at Claire, thinking about her great-great-grandfather Javier, and what he did for Claire’s great-great-grandmother Abigail, and what it could say about the two of them, sitting here in the damp grass, a hundred years later.

Then Julie finds an entire letter about Emmert.

The most dreadful thing just happened, Abigail wrote.

Oh, I wish Gregory could see Emmert for what he is! I have asked the morning girl to keep the windows open, as the heat has been unbearable these last few weeks. The wind from the ocean is quite blustery and always stirs up the curtains. I’ve never thought much of it, as my bedroom faces away from the garden, securing my privacy. But this morning, as I was dressing, I was horrified to find a narrow, leering face watching me: It was Mr. Emmert! I let out a horrified shriek and he scurried away, but when I took my concerns to Gregory, he once again utterly dismissed my complaints!

I do not understand why he consistently refuses to see Mr. Emmert for the scoundrel he is. His presence has always discomfited me—I’ve told you about his persistent stares anytime I take Charlotte into the garden. But for him to peer through my window, so brazenly—it’s beyond comprehension! And Gregory simply will not listen to me!

“Are you seeing the name Emmert?” Julie asks Claire. “He’s like a handyman or something for Abigail after she marries Gregory. She keeps talking about him. He sounds like a total creep.”

Claire looks up from her letter. “Yeah, I’ve seen a few mentions. He sounds scary.”

And then Julie comes to the final letter in her stack. It’s very short, and written in a scrawled, frantic hand:

My darling, the final preparations are ready. I know we shouldn’t trust him; I know he’s an absolute cretin. But he’s the only one who can make the arrangements, especially with Charlotte so young. Soon, we’ll all be together. Soon, our lives will begin.

“Claire.” Julie’s heart thumps. “I found something.”

“What is it?” Claire leans over Julie’s shoulder, her breath a spot of warmth on Julie’s skin. “Does it talk more about their affair?”

Julie only points to the letter. She rereads the lines along with Claire, her heart hammering the whole time, not only because of the discovery but because of Claire’s closeness.

“She was going to meet Javier,” Claire says, pulling away a little. “They were going to run off together, with Charlotte!”

“Damn,” Julie says. “And in the 1890s? I mean, damn.” She shakes her head. “But they didn’t. I mean, obviously.”

She glances at Claire out of the corner of her eye. Still two separate families.

“Maybe her husband found out,” Claire says. “Or—it looks like there was someone else involved, someone who was making the arrangements—” She taps the letter.

“I think that’s Mr. Emmert,” Julie says. “Maybe? It’s someone she doesn’t trust but someone she and Javier both know. And he definitely sounds like he was a cretin. I wish there was more about him in the letters.”

“You said you know for sure Javier’s your great-great-grandfather,” Claire says. “Are you sure Abigail’s not your great-great-grandmother?”

“Totally sure. Her name was Constancia. There’s a picture of her in the motel.” She slumps back. “See, the story as I’ve always heard it is that my great-great-grandfather saved up his money to buy the Indianola Motel. He changed the name to the Alvarez Motel around the turn of the century, and then he married my great-great-grandmother. There’s a picture of both of them hanging in the lobby.”

“So he definitely didn’t run off with Abigail and Charlotte,” Claire says. “What happened, do you think?”

Julie shakes her head. She feels flushed, wild with the possibility that at one point in history Claire’s ancestor and Julie’s ancestor were in love with each other. She wonders idly if she and Claire could have the happy ending that Javier and Abigail didn’t get.

No. Don’t think like that.

Claire looks down at the letter in her lap, and her hair falls into her face. It shines in the moonlight like gold.

“It’s dated,” she says. “The letter. See? July 18, 1893.”

“Okay,” Julie says.

Claire smiles. “There’s a library here, right? They’ve probably got old newspapers or something. We can look the date up, see if anything crazy happened around then. Maybe they just got caught. Or maybe something happened to stop them. It’s worth checking out, don’t you think?”

“They keep old newspapers at the library?”

“Yeah,” Claire says, laughing a little. “I know, I’m a nerd.”

“I don’t think you’re a nerd,” Julie says softly.

Clare ducks her head, smiling a little. Then she reaches over and plucks up the photograph of Abigail Garner. She holds it under the pool of light.

“I want to know what happened,” Claire says. “She’s so pretty.”

Silence. The night feels like it’s breathing.

“You look like her,” Julie says, and then her throat dries out.

Claire laughs. “You think I’m pretty?” She sounds pleased, maybe a little breathless.

“Sure,” Julie says, and tells herself that straight girls do this all the time, they always compliment each other this way. It’s normal.

“I find it hard to believe, is all.” Claire sets the picture down with the two set-aside letters. “Boys never like me.”

And there it is, that fatal stab. Boys.

But when Julie looks up at Claire, Claire is watching her with an unreadable expression. She doesn’t seem disgusted or put off. More—hopeful.

“Boys are idiots,” Julie says. “You’re pretty.”

Claire smiles. In that moment, in the honeyed nighttime, everything is all right.