“It is. I’m so sorry, Rebekkah. Maylene is—”

“No,” Rebekkah interrupted. “No!”

She slid down the wall as the world slipped out of focus, collapsed to the floor as her fears were confirmed, closed her eyes as her chest filled with a pain she hadn’t felt in a very long time.

“I’m so sorry.” William’s voice gentled even more. “We’ve been trying to call all day, but the number we had for you was wrong.”

“We?” Rebekkah stopped herself before she asked about Byron; she could handle a crisis without him at her side. He hadn’t been at her side for years, and she was just fine. Liar. Rebekkah felt the numbness, the need-to-cry-scream-choke grief that she couldn’t touch yet. She heard the whispered questions she’d wondered when Ella died. How could she not tell me? Why didn’t she call? Why didn’t she reach for me? Why wasn’t I there?

“Rebekkah?”

“I’m here. Sorry ... I just ...”

“I know.” William paused, and then reminded her, “Maylene must be interred within the next thirty-six hours. You need to come home tonight. Now.”

“I ... she ...” There weren’t words, not truly. The Claysville tendency to adopt green burial procedures, those that relied on the lack of embalming, unsettled her. She didn’t want her grandmother to return to the soil: she wanted her to be alive.

Maylene is dead.

Just like Ella.

Just like Jimmy.

Rebekkah clutched the phone tightly enough that the edges creased her hand. “No one called ... the hospital. No one called me. I would’ve been there if they called.”

“I’m calling now. You need to come home now,” he said.

“I can’t get there that quickly. The wake ... I can’t be there today . ”

“The funeral is tomorrow. Catch a red-eye.”

She thought about it, the things she’d need to do. Get Cherub’s carrier. Trash. Empty the trash. Water the ivy. Do I have anything respectable to wear? There were a dozen things to do. Focus on those. Focus on the tasks. Call the airline.