I woke with the notebook open beside the bed.
Sera's name was still the only thing on the page that hadn't become a question.
The household register placed her beside Cedric as his younger sister. The office had confirmed the source and the wording. Everything I had written beneath that concerned what I didn't know.
Where had she lived after the date of the entry? Why had nobody mentioned her? Did the gap on the portrait wall belong to her? Why had the name made this body's hand reach for someone it couldn't find?
I could arrange the questions into a story. That wouldn't make the story true.
I closed the notebook long enough to wash and dress. The repaired grip lay beside the practice schedule. The bag strap hung from its proper hook. Several ordinary things in the room now worked because someone had found a specific problem and fixed only that problem.
