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Elena remembered waking in the hospital, her throat raw, her mother crying. She remembered being told the mill was gone. She had never known the cause.

“I know what you are,” Celeste said. “I always did. But I never understood why you stopped talking to me.” prosis

She understood, finally, what her grandmother had meant when she said: We do not keep secrets to protect others. We keep them to protect the shape of a world that would collapse if every truth stood side by side in the light. Elena remembered waking in the hospital, her throat

In the morning, she found a new note under her door. A child’s handwriting: I told Father Michel about the bell. He said rust doesn’t make a clapper fall sideways. But he didn’t yell. I feel lighter. “I know what you are,” Celeste said

Elena looked at her oldest friend. Then she stood, walked to the shelf, and took down an empty box. It was oak, unfinished, without a name. She placed it on the table between them.