Chapter 22: Two Hours

We read it that night at the maple table, on Everett's laptop, with every light in the kitchen on.

He had sharpened the blurred photograph as far as it would go.

The page was a single sheet of the black composition book, headed in my mother's hand: The night before.

She had written it long before there was a wedding date to be the night before.

I read it once to myself, and then Everett read it aloud, because I couldn't.

"Ten p.m., S. tea. Ten-fifty, S. at the stairs. Wait for the house to settle."

"That's the hour she goes," I said. "I know that part."

"One-fifty, S. to C.'s room. Face only. Left cheek, down to the jaw. No one marries a girl like that."

I closed my eyes.

"Two o'clock, D. doors. M. phone. No one is to call until the time is up."

"Keep going," I said.

"Two to four, wait. Housekeeper for towels if needed. Do not let C. close her eyes." Everett stopped. "Callie."

"Read the rest."

"Three-fifty, D. drives her. I cry at the hospital. A girl who nearly dies is grateful. A grateful girl stays."

He stopped.

"Two hours is underlined," he said. "Twice. And in the margin there's another line, smaller."

"What does it say?"

"If Sloane goes too deep, it's still two hours."

I do not know how long I sat there.

I know the refrigerator hummed, and a car passed on the road, and Everett's hand came down over mine.

For days I had told myself how it ended.

I had said it to Everett in bed, in my own plain words: My mother took my phone, my brother locked the doors, and I died.

I had left something out.

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