Morning didn't shake the dream loose.
She woke with her fist clenched in the bedsheet, heart still beating too fast. For a second she half expected to find her shoes full of mud, her room damp, red fabric tangled around her ankles. Instead there was only sunlight pressing through the curtains and the faint hum of the fridge down the hall.
It's just a dream, she told herself.
But when she closed her eyes, she saw the crimson gown again—dark at the hem, heavy with water.
"Em? You awake?" her dad called from the kitchen.
"Yeah," she croaked, swinging her legs out of bed.
Her muscles ached pleasantly from yesterday. Not the walking, exactly—she hadn't realized until she'd gone to sleep how much tension she'd been carrying in her shoulders. She stretched until her spine cracked and told herself that meant she was fine.
In the bathroom mirror, her eyes looked shadowed, like something hadn't finished leaving her. She stared at herself for a moment, then grabbed her brush and pulled her hair into its usual tight braid.
"Okay," she told her reflection. "No more lake dreams."
Her reflection didn't argue.
Down the hall, Kate's door stood half open. Music spilled out—loud, dramatic, the kind of song that made everything feel important even if nothing was happening.
Kate appeared in the doorway a minute later in an oversized sweatshirt and shorts, hair doing whatever it wanted.
"You're up," Emily said.
Kate shrugged. "Mom says I have to 'fix my schedule' before freshman orientation." She made air quotes. "Apparently sleeping past nine is how you ruin your life."
"You'll survive," Emily said.
Kate studied her, eyes narrowing. "You look like you lost a fight."
"I didn't."
"With what?"
"Nothing."
Kate grinned. "Haunted."
"Go haunt your cereal," Emily said.
Kate laughed and wandered toward the kitchen.
Both of Emily's parents were at the table—her dad with coffee and the newspaper, her mom scrolling her phone between bites of toast. The kitchen smelled like eggs and butter and dish soap, the ordinary kind of morning that was supposed to make everything feel normal.
Kate dropped into a chair and stole a piece of toast from her dad's plate.
"Hey," he protested.
"Fuel," Kate said.
Emily sat and stared at her eggs longer than necessary.
"You're up early," her dad said. "Thought you'd sleep till noon."
"Senior summer," her mom added. "Enjoy it while you can."
"Can't wait," Emily said dryly.
Her dad smiled. "We aim to inspire."
Emily pushed her fork through the eggs without eating.
"Grandpa okay this morning?" she asked.
Her mom glanced up. "I talked to your grandma. He slept fine. Why?"
"He just seemed... shaken," Emily said.
Her dad nodded slowly. "Wouldn't you be? Going back to the place where your whole childhood used to be?"
Emily's dad had grown up in Montana, but not here. He'd met Mom at Montana State, and Hillsborough had always sounded like "home" when Mom said it—until Emily realized how much the word could hide.
Emily nodded, but that wasn't what she was thinking about.
"He talked about Clara," Emily said.
The table went quiet. Not abruptly—just enough to notice.
"Not much," Emily added quickly. "Just... graduation day. He said the sky was this same blue."
Her mom set her phone down carefully. "So he's thinking about her again."
"Again?" Emily asked.
"There was a time," her dad said, choosing his words, "when he mentioned her now and then. When you were younger. Before your grandma asked him not to."
Kate looked between them, alert but silent.
Emily swallowed. "Do you think she drowned?"
Her parents exchanged a glance.
"They searched," her mom said finally. "But graduation night was chaos."
Her dad nodded. "Your mom's told me about that night, and I've heard it from enough people to know how it went. They'd started flooding the valley. The water rose in stages, not all at once—but people were celebrating, packing, leaving. Equipment everywhere. By nightfall, flashlights didn't help much."
Emily's stomach tightened.
"So no one saw."
"No one who could be sure," her dad said.
"But it wasn't an accident," Emily said. The words surprised her with how firm they sounded. "The flooding was planned. They knew the water was coming."
Her dad nodded. "Yes. It was planned."
Planned.
The word sat wrong.
Kate pushed back from the table. "I'm going to go be productive," she announced. She grabbed an apple, then paused.
"If you're... thinking about weird stuff," she said to Emily, suddenly awkward, "you can tell me."
Emily blinked.
Kate shrugged. "I'm not a baby. I'm basically a high schooler."
Emily smiled. "I know."
Kate nodded once and left.
By ten, the heat was already rising off the pavement. Hillsborough in summer smelled like dust, pine sap, and gasoline from the two-pump station on Main.
Emily pulled on cutoffs and a tank top, laced her trail shoes, and filled a water bottle. On impulse, she grabbed the cheap digital camera she'd found at a thrift store—a clunky silver thing that made everything feel harder to erase.
Her phone buzzed.
A text from Grandma.
Grandma: Morning, Emmy.Grandma: Your grandpa's acting like he's fine. Which means he isn't.Grandma: You okay?
Emily stared at the screen.
Emily: I'm okay. Just thinking about yesterday.Emily: Tell Grandpa I'm glad we went.
A pause.
Grandma: He was glad too.Grandma: Just be careful down there. The county's starting work on the dam early.
Emily's pulse jumped.
So it wasn't later. It was now.
Emily: I will.
She slid her phone into her pocket before she could think too hard about why the message felt like both a warning and a comfort.
"Where are you headed?" her mom called.
"Just out," Emily said. "Thought I'd take pictures."
Her mom frowned. "Stay away from the reservoir."
"I'm not going in," Emily said. "Just the overlook. I'll text."
Her mom hesitated, then nodded. "Okay. But text."
"I will."
Mostly.
The drive back to Pine Valley felt different alone.
Yesterday it had been full of Tom's memories—names, places, the way his voice shifted when he didn't want to finish a thought. Today it was just heat and sky, still that same impossible blue.
Emily parked by the picnic shelter and sat for a moment with her hands on the wheel.
New signs had been posted.
CAUTION: UNSTABLE GROUNDDAM MAINTENANCE — AREA RESTRICTEDHISTORICAL SITE — DO NOT REMOVE ARTIFACTS
Someone had scrawled beneath them in marker: Too late.
Emily should have turned around.
Instead she grabbed her camera and walked to the overlook.
The basin looked harsher in midday light. The remaining ribbon of water glared like metal.
Her phone buzzed.
Mom: You there?
Emily: Yep. Just the overlook.
For now.
The boat ramp jutted out above the valley floor, a narrow path worn beside it by curiosity. Emily hesitated, then started down.
The slope was steeper than it looked. Dust slid under her shoes, but she kept her footing. The heat pressed in; the breeze off the water cooled the sweat at her neck.
At the bottom, the mud was firm in places and soft in others. Shoe prints marked the surface.
The foundations rose higher from this angle.
Emily stepped into the outline of Whitman's Grocery, then moved on. Barbershop. Grange Hall. Tile half-buried in dirt.
She crouched, brushed it clean, and left it where it was.
Then she saw it.
The Jennings place.
The water there was darker. Still.
Emily stopped at the edge.
"Hi, Clara," she whispered.
Her voice sounded too loud.
She crouched and scanned the depression. Something rusted lay just beneath the waterline—too straight to be natural.
Her heart sped up.
Cellar, her mind supplied.
She told herself not to jump to conclusions.
But when she eased down the slope and brushed away silt, her fingers found edges.
A frame.
A door.
Emily sat back hard, mud squelching under her.
"Okay," she whispered. "Okay."
She didn't open it.
Not today.
She climbed back up, wiped her hands on her shorts, and took one photo.
Just in case.
The image looked ordinary.
Her skin still prickled.
Emily turned toward the ramp, knowing one thing with absolute certainty:
Whatever had happened here hadn't been finished.
And she had just stepped into it.