Graveminder by Melissa Marr

normal, even if Maylene’s absence wasn’t. She wanted— needed —some part of coming home to be like it always was.
    Rebekkah sat down on the porch swing. The chains creaked as she set it to swaying, and she smiled a little. This was right. It was home. She wrapped the afghan around her, looked up at the flickers of light in the sky, and whispered, “What am I going to do without you?”
    “You all right?”
    The voice in the darkness drew Rebekkah’s attention. A girl of no more than seventeen— older than Ella ever was —stood on the front lawn. Her features were drawn tight with tension, and her posture was wary.
    “No, not so much.” Rebekkah looked past her, seeking the girl’s friends, but she seemed to be alone.
    “You’re Maylene’s kin, right? The one not from here?”
    Rebekkah put her feet down, stopping the movement of the swing. “Do I know you?”
    “Nope.”
    “So ... you knew my grandmother, then? She’s gone. Died.”
    “I know.” The girl stepped forward. Her gait was awkward, like she was trying to force herself to move slower than was natural. “I wanted to come here.”
    “By yourself? At three-thirty in the morning? Things must have changed if your parents let you get away with that.” Rebekkah felt a ghost of a smile on her lips. “I thought curfew was still at sunset unless you were with a group.”
    The screen door slapped shut with a sharp crack as Byron came outside. His expression was cast in shadows, but she didn’t need to see his face to know he was tense. His tone told her everything as he said, “Do you need us to call someone for you?”
    “No.” The girl stepped backward, away from the porch and deeper into the darkness.
    Byron stepped to the edge of the porch, positioning himself in front of Rebekkah. “I’m not sure what you’re looking for here, but ...”
    The girl turned and vanished, disappearing so suddenly that if Rebekkah didn’t know better she’d think the girl had been a hallucination.
    “She’s just gone. ” Rebekkah shivered. “Do you think she’ll be all right?”
    “Why wouldn’t she?” Byron didn’t turn to face her; instead, he stood staring out into the darkness where the girl had disappeared.
    Rebekkah pulled her afghan tighter around her. “Byron? Should we go after her? Do you know her? I felt like ... I don’t know. Should we call Chris or her family or—”
    “No.” He looked over his shoulder at her. “We were out after hours half the time when we were her age.”
    “Not alone.”
    “Yes, we were.” Byron laughed, but it sounded forced. “How many times did I walk you two home and then haul ass to get back before Dad caught me out alone after curfew?”
    In a guilty flash, Rebekkah remembered running inside so she didn’t have to see him kissing Ella good night. She forced herself to hold his gaze. “Maybe I was braver then.” She paused, frowned, and stared past him into the darkness. “God, listen to me. I’m not even back a day, and I’m worrying about curfew. Most towns, most cities don’t have sunset curfews.”
    “There’s nowhere quite like Claysville, is there?” He came to sit on the far end of the swing.
    “Between the two of us, I think we’d have found it if there was.” With one foot, she pushed against the porch and set the swing to swaying again. “Do you feel the ... I don’t know... click when you come back here?”
    Byron didn’t pretend to misunderstand. “I do.”
    “I hate that feeling sometimes; it made me want to stay away more . But Maylene is— was everything. I’d see her and sometimes I could forget that Ella was ...”
    “Gone.”
    “Right. Gone,” she whispered. “Now Maylene and Jimmy are both gone , too. My family is gone, so why does it still feel right coming home? It feels right the moment I cross that line. All those prickling feelings that I feel everywhere else I go vanish when I pass that stupid sign.”
    “I know.” He pushed the swing again; the