The rest of the week flows as calmly as it can. I avoid home as much as possible, which proves easy since school takes up most of my time anyway. Outside of school, I take a page from Jonah’s book and hang out at libraries and cafes, dropping into our group to talk to the Killer Kids as much as possible. Patrick searches criminal records for our ‘Kay’ and is floored when I tell him where she was found.

“I snuck into my mom’s papers this afternoon, and she’s got all the reports they sent home with Kay. Apparently, she came all the way from Spain. Like, who disappears from Minnesota and winds up a year later in freaking Madrid?”

“No shit,” Patrick responds, clicking away at his keyboard. “You sure it’s not New Mexico or New York? They’ve got Madrids too.”

“Nah, I double checked. Definitely Old Spain. Like, Madrid-Madrid.”

The clicking stops for a moment, and then continues. “I’ll broaden my search internationally. She got an accent or something you can pinpoint? You think she’s really from Spain?”

I feel myself frowning and furrowing my brows. “You know, I don’t think I’ve heard her talk enough to tell. Her voice is a little odd to me. I’ll try to bait her more.” I stir the wooden stick in my coffee for a moment and listen to the rhythmic typing and breathing in my headphones. “You believe me, right Patrick? Like, you’re not just humoring me?”

“I think you’d know your own sister, An. I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t think it would help.” The typing pauses again, and he sighs. “I can’t say the same for Mara, though. Or Laney, for that matter. I think they’re coming around though, I really do. I can’t even see how someone could think Kaylie and Kay even look alike. Like, have they ever seen a girl of color?”

I laugh a bit unders my breath. “What, like, you think they’re sitting there looking at the pictures like ‘All you people look the same’?”

“I mean, not consciously, but... kinda yeah.” We laugh at the kind of funny that isn’t quite funny but you don’t know how else to respond to it. “They care though. You know they really do.”

“Sunny and Jonah, though?” I imagine they’re both in, since they defended me, but I ask just to be sure. It’d be a huge blow to keep talking to Jonah and find out he thinks I’m nutty.

“You could tell them you had sprouted antennas in the middle of the night and they’d both immediately ask how they could help.”

I laugh, but I feel myself blush too. “How do you even help with antenna sproutage, Patrick? Like, what even could they do? I’m pretty sure that Jonah would ask for photos and Sunny would ask me what I was on the night before.”

“Jonah will always ask for more photos of you. That doesn’t even count.”

Before I can ask what he even means by that, I see Mara’s name turn green. There’s some loud, awkward fumbling that I wish she would have hit mute on her microphone for and then she says hello.

“I bought the ticket to come visit!” she blurts out before either of us respond, and for a split second I almost ask her where she was going. Then it’s obvious.

“Going to see Patrick?” I ask anyway.

“Greyhound on the 15th! For a whole week--I’m so excited!”

“Cool,” says Patrick. If Mara picks up on how weirdly unexcited he sounds, she doesn’t express it. She continues on as I start clicking around online for articles about when my sister disappeared. I’ve read them all before, as they were rolling out, but now that the press has deemed her alive and well and certainly not an impersonator in my house all the articles are cropping up with updates and links. I just about zone out when suddenly the drink I was working on splashes all over my chest. I stand suddenly, spitting expletives.

“My bad,” a girl from school feigns for a millisecond before adding, “Murderer.” She and her friends walk off laughing. I just roll my eyes and sit down, ignoring the other customers watching me, waiting for me to show any sign of anger that could make them think I was hostile or wicked, like they assumed my dad acted. Nevermind that he lived here all his life and was friends with half the town.

“Fuckin’ bitches,” Mara hisses as I pop my earbuds back in and sigh.

“You okay?” Patrick asks.

I pat my napkin to my chest. “Well, my cream-colored shirt now has a nice coffee stain to go with it. But it wasn’t that hot, and has the added benefit of smelling like white mocha. So I’ve got that going for me today.”

“Until the milk starts to spoil and then it’ll smell--” Mara starts before stopping herself. “Sorry, spent a summer as a barista once. Just get it cleaned as soon as you can.”

I frown and lift the shirt to sniff. Great. Guess I would be going home earlier than I thought.