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about this often. But it would also be wrong to say that she assigned it any significance other than that it was the last time she saw her sister and that it was a cruelly meaningless last memory.
    . . .
    S issy looked at Kevin. He hadn’t heard the door open, didn’t know they weren’t alone. He was still saying Sissy’s name, still enticing her to sit on it. Very gently, she undid Kevin’s grasp on the waistline of her pants. She rested his hand on his knee, which is when he opened his eyes. At first all he saw was Sissy, at least that’s what he would say later, glorifying the moment. “She looked like a fucking goddess on fire,” he said. “All that red hair. Shit.” But then he saw Mrs. Jeffreys, and Mrs. Jeffreys, seeing that he was finished, felt at liberty to speak.
    “Zip your fly,” she said. “Kevin Thorpe, zip your fly.” Mrs. Jeffreys was still crying, but she stood up straight, refusing to leave them alone. She held out her hand. “Sissy,” she said. And Sissy, everyone’s favorite little sister, went to her. She put her hand in Mrs. Jeffreys’ and together they left the mudroom, left the party, and walked to the foot of the cul-de-sac to the three-story Tudor where Mr. Lindell lay on a couch, not knowing that his fourteen-year-old daughter was only a few blocks away, under the escort of Mrs. Jeffreys.
    In ten different ways, on that interminable three-block walk, Mrs. Jeffreys promised Sissy that she had no choice but to rat her out to her father. The entire walk, in fact, she said that she owed it to Mr. Lindell to tell him what Sissy had done. That even if she wanted to keep it a secret, she couldn’t. It was her responsibility as a parent, as a mother. Sissy said nothing, but clutched at Mrs. Jeffreys’ hand and listened as she talked.
    “What I wish is that nothing had happened. What I wish is that there was nothing to tell. The position you put me in. Can you imagine? Oh, Sissy.”
    At the front door of the Tudor, Mrs. Jeffreys stopped talking. She turned Sissy towards her, looked her up and down, and said, “Who are you supposed to be, anyway? What’s your costume?”
    Sissy looked down as if trying to figure out the answer. She looked at her hands, then at the sleeves of her shirt. She remembered finding the flannel western in the bottom drawer of Nora’s bureau. She remembered spending the entire afternoon just trying to find a few pieces of clothes in her sister’s drawers that would fit her. She remembered holding up Nora’s earrings one at a time, before deciding on a pair to wear to the party.
    “I’m Nora,” Sissy said finally and held up her arms, as if motioning to her entire body. “See?”
    Mrs. Jeffreys shook her head, tried to hold back tears. “You poor thing,” she said, then rang the doorbell. “You poor, poor thing.”
    Of course, when Mr. Lindell answered the door, exactly what Sissy had thought would happen, happened. She was handed over. Mr. Lindell didn’t ask. Mrs. Jeffreys didn’t offer. The latter returned to the party, where she officiated that much more closely, and the next day Mr. Jeffreys installed a lock on the outside of the mudroom, as if taking away the place would also take away the instinct.
    Sissy went upstairs to her sister’s bedroom, closed the door, climbed under the bed, and lowered the mattresses on top of her. Mr. Lindell went back to the couch. They kept the lights off and, like this, they passed the anniversary of Nora’s disappearance.

4
    S arah Jeffreys was twelve years old when she got into the backseat of Franco Bowles’ Dodge. They were neighbors. They’d grown up together—if you can say that a twelve-year-old and a nineteen-year-old can grow up together. But they’d lived on the same block, gone to the same pool parties—those ageless affairs where mothers and fathers and high schoolers tolerated the company of middle schoolers, even lower schoolers, because they were related, because it passed the hour, the day,