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After lunch Evelyn went to the doorstep and looked out into the garden. The dust in the air had turned the sun to pewter, though she still couldn’t hear the storm itself. She wondered if Lily would be back before it came. Or if she would be somewhere else entirely.

She decided she would pickle some vegetables. She’d been meaning to for days. She pushed the pile of tools up to one end of the table, then fetched three of their pickling jars from the back of the kitchen. The vinegar in them was cloudy, years old. She set about mindlessly chopping onions, beetroot, and cucumbers and filling the jars. When each one was full, she held it to the light and inspected it, the contents pale and fleshy, pushed up against the glass like parts of a small body. She stowed the jars in the larder, then came back to the table.

She missed her sister with her whole heart. Hated her no less for that.

Evelyn looked for another task to keep her from thinking about what might happen or had already happened. In truth she had no idea what lay beyond the wall, not now. There had been monsters once, but that was so long ago. Since then, she had spent day after day after day trying to reassure her sister that no, there were no such things, and Mama’s stories had been no more than stories, even when she knew the truth of them.

So many years of divided loyalties. So many years trying to be a good sister and a good daughter, and failing at both because one forbade the other.

She tried to make some dough. Never too late to learn, and she would have to now. It had always been Lily’s job in the past, as Evelyn had lacked some intrinsic gift for baking that apparently couldn’t be explained. Lily told her she “thought about it too much.”

“Perfect job for you, Lils,” Evelyn said out loud. “One that requires little to no thinking.”

Her words seemed to make it only inches from her mouth before the silence of the room swallowed them and the tide of sorrow rose in her so quickly she worried she might pass out.

She mixed cupfuls of flour and water and added some of Lily’s starter, a pot of sour sludge that she had been cultivating for decades. The mixture was sticky and cloying between her fingers. She added more flour. Kneaded and pounded until her knuckles struck the tabletop and the skin on them became sore and scuffed. The gardening tools shuddered at the other end of the table. However she adjusted the recipe, the dough was either too wet or too dry, and soon it had grown larger than the bowl itself and become quite unmanageable.

She left the mess on the table and went out into the day. She walked without seeing or hearing until she arrived at Mama’s grave, though that had never been her conscious intention.

She stood in front of the stone. The flowers had not yet been replanted and the earth was still barren. Her whole body felt transparent in the heat.

“She’s gone,” Evelyn said.

The grave was as silent as the rest of the garden.

“Lily’s gone. She went with the boy. Thank goodness.”

Such an intense throbbing in her head. Evelyn could not hear herself, much less her mother.

“I’m sorry I let him come in at all, Mama. I’m so sorry. But it’s fixed now. He’s gone, and she’s gone, and it’s all better. Just me and you.”

Again she felt the urge to weep, but she knew that her mother would not approve, and the effort of repressing her tears gave way to a kind of cramp in the muscles around her mouth.

“We’ll be fine,” she said. “I’m the only one who knows what to do anyway. I don’t even think I’ll need to cook. I don’t mind eating things raw. And, gosh, how nice to have a bit of peace and quiet, after all this time. I feel like I’m waking up from a bad dream.” She paused. “I should have done it a long time ago. I should have listened to you. You wouldn’t have stood for it. You never did stand for it. I was too soft. But it’ll be better from now on.”

She waited. Mama still had no reply for her.

“Why are you being like this?” said Evelyn. “Is it because of the flowers? The boy took the flowers. Lily let him. It’s not my fault.”

The was a gust of wind, and Evelyn blinked the dust out of her eyes.

“It’s not my fault , Mama!” she cried. “None of this is my fault!”

She turned and left the graveside, walked all through the front garden and then the back, calling Lily’s name over and over and hearing only her own voice echoing back from the battlements of the house. Lily could not have gone. Why would she go? She never did anything that Evelyn told her to do, so why start now? She must be hiding. That was it. They both were. Just a game. Lily was too old to climb over the wall anyway. There was no way she could have left.

By evening Evelyn’s throat was hoarse and neither had made an appearance.

“Yes, yes,” she muttered to herself, “very funny, Lily. Very funny.”

She dragged herself to the gazebo and sat there as it grew dark. A sky the color of a faded rose, and Lily somewhere out there under it. There were still sequins wedged in the cracks between the boards. Evelyn could not bear to see them, so she left the bench and went over to the edge of the little island and put her feet in the water. There was scum on the surface of the lake that had not been there before.

The stars came out. Her feet went numb. Evelyn wanted the storm to come quickly, wanted Lily’s monstrous eel to come from the depths so she could present herself to it as a willing sacrifice. She didn’t know how long she stayed there, but eventually the thought came to her like a struck bell, Yes, I will , and she slipped from the shore and lowered herself completely into the black water, her nightdress ballooning around her, her skull deliciously cold.