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So about proirly; she said I was the only person she could talk to about those kinds of things My mother certainly wouldn't, and neither would Conrad and Jerehter

She said, "Make sure you send one to any of s or proms yet No one had asked me, and I hadn't really felt like it The one person I wanted to go with didn't go to ht me last summer"

"What dress?"

"The one froht over that time Remember, you put it in my suitcase?"

She frowned, confused "I didn't buy you that dress Laurel would've had a fit" Then her face cleared, and she sht it for you"

"My mother?" My mother would never

"That's your mother So like her"

"But she never said" My voice trailed off I hadn't even considered the possibility that it had been ht it for me

"She wouldn't She's not like that" Susannah reached across the table and grabbed irl in the world to have her for a ray, and there was a chill in the air It would rain soon

It was so misty out that it took me a minute to find him I finally did, about half a , his knees close to his chest He didn't look at me when I sat down next to him He just stared out at the ocean

His eyes were these bleak and e there The boy I thought I kneas gone He looked so lost sitting there I felt that old lurch, that gravitational pull, that desire to inhabit him--like wherever he was in this world, I would knohere to find him, and I would do it I would find him and take him home I would take care of him, just like Susannah wanted

I spoke first "I'm sorry I'm really, really sorry I wish I had known--"

"Please stop talking," he said

"I' the wrong thing

"Don't leave," Conrad said, and his shoulders collapsed His face did too He hid it in his hands, and he was five years old again, we both were