Chapter 7
Back to school.
Weeks of walking by Agnes’s house. No sightings. No sign of her along Queen Street or the boardwalk. Winter grew milder by the minute.
Saturday night, she went to bed at nine thirty, riding her hand as she thought of Agnes’s tongue. She didn’t know quite how to feel about the girl down the street: one minute Agnes was all over her, the next, no sign of life. Underwear in the mail, then radio silence. It was confounding, to say the least. Agnes must surely have changed her mind, after so many weeks of nothing. Really, it was stupid to be so obsessed with someone she barely knew.
Ruth fell asleep with her hand between her legs, cradling her endless ache.
She awoke to the sound of scratching at her bedroom window.
“Agnes!”
The girl’s forehead pressed a
