Page 289 of What We Burn

“Apparently not.” She picks up her donut again and takes a bite, chewing slowly. “So you’re asking me if I’m okay with all of this. With knowing.”

“Yep.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever be okay with it,” she admits. “But I understand it. I’m not going to tell anybody.” The crooked smile appears. “I mean, technically, I’m a murderer now too. So it’s not like I’ve got the moral high ground.”

“Stab sisters,” I say.

She holds up her fist. I bump it.

“Stab sisters,” she confirms. “That’s our band name now. Nonnegotiable.”

We grin at each other—two women who’ve crossed lines they can never uncross, eating donuts above a crematorium, and somehow still finding the funny in it.

Her breath catches, but she controls it and finishes her donut. “Can I say something that might sound weird?”

“Everything we’ve said in this kitchen sounds weird. Go ahead.”

“I actually feel better. Now that I know. The not knowing was worse—having pieces of a picture and no frame to put them in. My brain kept filling in the gaps with stuff that was scarier than the truth.” She shrugs. “The truth is still terrifying. But at least it makes sense. Dean hasn’t really said much—just that he helps when he’s needed, no questions asked. But now that you’ve talked me through it, I can stop building conspiracy theories in my head until four a.m. and finally sleep.”

“You still haven’t been sleeping?”

“Not really. But I’ve been a little better since you and Holden got all my things. Thanks for that, by the way. Having my own clothes and books and stuff—it makes this place feel like mine instead of somewhere I’m hiding.” She pauses, looking down at her mug. “I really, really don’t want to go back though. To the apartment. Ever.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I mean it, Sage. Not even to pick up whatever’s left. The furniture, the kitchen stuff, whatever didn’t fit in the boxes—I don’t want any of it. Don’t want to look at it again. Every time I think about that living room, I see—” She stops. Swallows. Regroups. “I just can’t.”

“What do you want me to do with it?”

She looks at me. Steady and certain, the Amy who stabbed a man twice and watched a truckload of bodies disappear into a crematorium is still standing.

“Burn it,” she says. “Burn it all.”

“I know a guy.”

“Of course you do.” She laughs—bright and startled, the kind that sneaks past the grief. “God. My life. My actual life.”

“Welcome to the family, Ames.”

“The murder family.”

“We prefer ‘justice collective.’”

“That’s worse. That’s so much worse.”

We’re still laughing when Dean appears in the doorway. And the expression on his face—quiet, relieved, like he’s been listening for exactly this and finally heard it—helps the tightness in my chest ease.

“Good talk?” he asks.

“The best. She’s strong, Dean.”

“Strongest person I’ve ever met.” He says it simply. And the way he looks at my friend tells me everything about where this is heading.

Go Amy!

“Take care of her,” I say.

“Already am.”