Perfect Ruin. Lauren DeStefano

experienced its one and only water storm. To think a boy named after Judas could commit such a crime.

      Pen pulls excitedly on my sleeve. “It’s all like a tawdry romantic horror,” she says. “Can you even believe it?”

      It’s all anyone in the cafeteria is talking about. I know because I overhear pieces of conversation—“Did anyone know them?”—“always a little strange”—“pretty girl”—“stuck up, if you ask me.” But I don’t find myself among them. I’m not interested in the gossip. I’m more worried about the aftermath.

      “Wonder when the trial will begin,” Basil says.

      “They’ll have a difficult time finding a jury, I imagine,” Thomas says. “It’s supposed to be unbiased. Who can be unbiased about murder? It’s clearly wrong.”

      “Unless he didn’t do it,” I blurt, surprising myself. Everyone’s eyes are on me. “I mean—that’s what the trial is for, isn’t it? To determine innocence?”

      Pen shrugs. “Guess we’ll see. Is there a math exam this week?”

      And the topic of Daphne Leander and Judas Hensley dies away.

      “Lex?”

      “What is it?” he says after a pause. I knocked, but he won’t open his office door to me. Lost in his brilliance, I suppose. He was always like that—going off by himself. But his blindness has intensified it.

      “I wanted to talk to you,” I say.

      “Talk about what?”

      “Things,” I say. “That’s what sisters do. You know, because you’re my brother and I care about you?”

      “You bug me,” he says. “That’s what sisters do. How do you know I’m not trying to nap?”

      “You aren’t,” I press. “The ceiling is practically crumbling over my bedroom.”

      He ignores me. Alice, standing at the end of the hall, frowns in apology. Lex has even begun to elude her. I worry for him, alone in all that blackness.

      I sit on the floor and lean against the door.

      “Who was that little girl at your jumper group?” I ask. “She had a bow in her hair.” Too late, I realize a physical description won’t do my brother any good. “She can’t be more than eleven or twelve.”

      No answer.

      “The day of the fire, I caught her putting up papers in the ladies’ room at the theater. I think she put them up at the academy, too. They were copies of a paper Daphne Leander wrote about the gods being a myth.”

      The door opens, and I tense to keep from falling backward. Lex reaches out for me.

      “Where are you?” he says.

      “Down here.” I hold up my hand and he takes it, feeling his way until he’s on his knees across from me.

      “That girl is none of your concern,” he says.

      “Is she really a jumper?” I say.

      “Yes. And you have no business talking to her.”

      “She’s Daphne Leander’s sister,” I say. “Isn’t she?”

      “I’m not kidding, Morgan. You stay away from her.”

      He’s in a miserable mood, and there’s no sense pressing him for more, but all he’s done is pique my interest.

      “Since you’re out, come on and eat something,” Alice says. “I made berry cobbler.”

      Later, when Lex has retreated to his office once again, Alice is washing the dishes and I’m drying them.

      “He is right,” she says. “It’s best if you stay away from that girl.”

      “Who is she?” I say. Alice takes her husband’s side about most things, but she’s always had a soft spot for me.

      “You were right,” she says, handing me a dripping plate. “She’s Daphne’s sister. She may be a little girl, but she’s got a lot of demons. It’s best if you let her alone.”

      I’ve heard that saying used to describe my brother. “A lot of demons.” That’s what my father said while we all kept vigil at Lex’s bedside in the hospital. I didn’t know what he meant. But now I’m thinking of Amy Leander, and what it must have been like to learn her sister wouldn’t be coming home. It was the most awful thing I could imagine, watching my brother fight to breathe in that sterile room. But at least he was breathing.

      Alice starts talking about frivolous things—greenhouse vegetation and silver earrings in jewelry shop windows that she thinks will make my eyes sparkle—and I play along, but she isn’t fooling me. There’s something happening to Internment. That’s as certain as Daphne Leander is dead.

       8

       Every star has been set in the sky. We mistakenly think they were put there for us.

      —“Intangible Gods,” Daphne Leander, Year Ten

      BASIL THROWS A STONE INTO THE LAKE, trying to make it skip.

      “Like this,” I say, pitching the stone into the water at an angle. It hits the surface and promptly sinks. Basil tries not to laugh.

      “Well, I was good at it when I was little, anyway.” I fall back into the grass and watch a cloud that’s sloping over the atmosphere.

      “Our engineers spend so much time studying the ground,” Basil says, settling beside me. “Ever think about what’s above us?”

      “The tributary,” I say. “The god of the sky.”

      “But those are intangible,” Basil says. “Spiritual. What I mean is, what if there’s more land up there? What if there are people living on the stars?”