THEY DROVE TOWARD TOWN in her immaculately maintained Corolla, Sonia changing radio stations while she fingertipped the steering wheel with small and subtle movements, hardly seeming to consult the street. “So,” she said, “how long has it been since you were back?”

“Fifteen years.”

“That was for your mother’s funeral, wasn’t it?”

Scott nodded, wondering at the implication that death was the only compelling reason that one might revisit the past. But Sonia seemed distracted, lost in her own thoughts. A fat squirrel shot out in front of the car and across the street, chasing a loose tangle of leaves. He caught a whiff of wood smoke drifting in the bright distance balanced with the scent of apples, smells and sights crisper than normal, and realized that he hadn’t taken his pills yet today, or yesterday for that matter.

“What about you?” he asked. “How long have you been back?”

“Almost two years now.”

“Weren’t you going to law school?”

“I dropped out of Loyola after my second term…” She reached for a Styrofoam cup of coffee in the cup holder, took a sip, and put it back. “It’s only temporary. Circumstances with my father …”

“Right,” he said, and they both went quiet again.

“But, hey, look at you.” She flicked her eyes up and down, from haircut to shoes, seeming to take his measure in a single glance. “You’ve done all right for yourself.”

Scott felt the first pinpricks of sweat tickling his hairline. The car abruptly felt too small. He ought not to have accepted this ride from her; he had allowed himself to get caught up in the immediate and visceral thrill of seeing her again without considering the implications of being stuck in conversation for a ninety-minute drive. But there was no getting out of it now.

“You always said you were going to be a writer,” she said. “Is that what you’re doing?”

“I write greeting cards.”

“Hallmark boy.” She nodded. “Now I get it.”

“I still manage a little fiction on the side.” This was a flat-out lie, but he made it sound slightly better by adding, “Not that I’ve had much time to do it lately. Random House isn’t exactly knocking down my door.”

“Hey,” Sonia said, “relax. It’s great that you’re getting paid to write anything. Who gets to do that?”

“It’s not exactly the great American novel.”

“Yeah, well”—she gave him a wry half smile—“pouring beers isn’t really practicing law either. But I guess nothing ever turns out quite the way you expect it, does it?”

“Yeah, I guess not.”

Another silence, this one heavier somehow, measured in miles, and Scott felt it now, the past riding between them like a hitchhiker they’d picked up along the way. It might have been that notion in the abstract—the almost palpable presence of the past—that triggered the next idea in his mind. Once acknowledged, it wouldn’t go away.

“Do you mind if we take a detour before the airport?”

She frowned. “What about your flight?”

“We’ve still got time.”

“You’re sure?”

Scott nodded. “Turn here. Take a left on Broad, follow it down.”

They drove half a mile, and he gave more directions, wondering now if Sonia realized where they were headed. If she did, she said nothing. Their route became a country road, climbing, dithering, and unmarked except for an occasional mailbox, up to an unassuming intersection marked only by a black smear of tire marks and the bright yellow sap of the broken tree.

“Is this where your father …?” She let the question fade, unfinished.

“Yeah.” He climbed out, trembling only a little, wishing now he’d remembered to take his pills but not wanting to pull them out in front of her. Under his boots, tiny fragments of grit spangled the roadside. This was all that was left of his father, a pair of black tire marks, crumbs of broken windshield glass, a demolished young pine—and then he remembered the manuscript, more marks left across a blank surface, more dead pulp. Looking at the angle of the swerve, Scott felt his eyes drawn back to the unmarked dirt road that joined the main highway here, and found himself wondering what a man like Frank Mast might have been doing up there.

Whether he saw it then—a glint of old iron, buried a hundred yards back in the woods—or only thought he did when he later remembered that moment, he didn’t know. He walked back to the car.

“Let’s go up that way,” he said, pointing up the dirt road.

“Why?”

“I just want to check it out.” He got in, still watching her. The moment felt odd, a segment of the past spliced into the present. “You mind?”

Shrugging, Sonia put the car in gear. The bare dirt surface bumped and scraped underneath them. It was a bad road and she drove slowly, mindful of the car’s suspension. The trees grew thick and low above the road, and pine boughs hissed off the roof like stiff brooms brushing metal. After a few minutes, Scott could see that the old gates really were there after all, still partially disguised by the piney overgrowth that surrounded them. They stood ajar, as if the last person to come along hadn’t had time to get out and close them behind him, and he stared at them as they passed through, turning his head to watch them go by.

That was when he first saw the house.