If Elena had to look at one more casserole, she was sure she'd throw up. What was it about church women that made them think every life event needed a casserole? Baby birthing, cancer-battling, marriages and deaths. Someone graduated? Pre-made meals. Someone's engaged? Pre-made meals. Someone stubbed a toe? Pre-made meals. Perhaps it isn't quite so ridiculous, Elena tempered her thoughts, but she'd been in Surette only a short while and been asked to contribute meals to at least three or four events. (She'd always sheepishly declined, having a hard enough time feeding her boys.) Food had been important to her family, growing up, and it'd marked occasions and events, but that'd been different. Her mother's and her grandmother's cooking had been signs of love for the one who'd eat, not a bandaid to put over a fresh wound. Even if often the food had eased a bad day or a stung heart, it had been meant as affection, never as a palliative. The church women, though? They didn't know her, and they certainly hadn't known Eddie. Their casseroles could go to Hell.

She dumped this one in her trash can without even peeling the foil lid off its top, just like all the others.

Five days had passed . . . five excruciating days. There'd been no word of Eddie, not so much as a fiber of his clothing or a sighting in a passing car to assuage Elena's anguish. She'd tried to sleep, hoping to find her son in her dreams; the waking hours dragged tortuously, augmenting her worsening fear that something irreversible had become of the boy. While the unrelenting rains washed away any potential clues lingering in the drainage ditch, Elena begged her inner-self for clairvoyance. She'd often felt things, sensed things—even the notion to move to Surette had seemed whispered to her from some kernel of foresight within—so why wouldn't she hope for preternatural inspiration regarding her son? And yet nothing of any help had emerged to shine light on the shadowed mystery. In fact, if anything, her dreams had confused and frightened her even more. While Elena couldn't recall the details of her nightmares, she had the impression that they were filled with children, many children, broken children, and all of them blind.

She didn't see them, or at least, she couldn't remember seeing them. Only the sensation of their presence lingered long after she'd been pulled from sleep. If Eddie were amongst those children, she was sure she would've spotted him, felt him, and so in the way all people attempt to console themselves with entirely adventitious circumstances, Elena told herself it was a good thing if Eddie wasn't amongst those in her dreams. Perhaps, she thought, I am sensing the spirits of lost children, those who've died in some terrible manner, and Eddie's absence means he's still alive!

Tomás wasn't much help, not that she held him accountable for it. The young man ghosted about the house, hesitant to speak with her, uncertain how to behave; she could tell he didn't know how to treat her, didn't want to test her fragility, but his concern for her, no matter how well-intentioned, became onerous. When she'd suggested he return to school, the seventeen-year-old had been visibly (though not vocally) relieved.

Returning to work, on the other hand, felt impossible. With Tomás out of the house, she could cry and call for Eddie as much as she wanted to. She spent most of her waking hours in his room, lying on his cosmos-themed bedding, running hands over the various items typical of little boys: action figures and Pokémon cards, back-of-the-door basketball hoop and childhood stuffies, books and baseball hats—anything she could find. Somehow, touching Eduardo's belongings enabled her to feel closer to her son, but Elena had another motive as well; she hoped connecting with the items her boy loved would provide her with insight, perhaps even foresight, into where he was.

It was a fruitless hope.

All she had were the dreams, now, and the strange incident Tomás had shared with her: a dead sheep. He'd called it a lamb, actually, though he'd admitted he'd never been close enough to really tell. According to the young man, he'd come across it hanging from a tree outside the St. James house, but before he could make sense of it, a priest and a police officer had shown up, and he'd been told to go home.

If there'd been more to it, Elena didn't know. Tomás hadn't been particularly forthcoming, although he had told her he'd not spoken to Trent, the man who'd asked her about her children. Elena had pushed the matter back in her brain, covered it up with fresh feverish speculation, unable to stop her terrible imaginings. The worst pain she'd ever known was indulging thoughts of what might have happened or still be happening to her baby, allowing her inner theater to delineate every one of his cries and expressions, every gut-wrenching harm some other human could be inflicting upon him. Was he alive and abused, calling for her, weeping, wondering why Mamá wasn't there to protect him? Why she couldn't find him? The thought crushed her—Eddie torn from his childhood illusions, knowing now the true depravity and suffering at work in the world.

Suddenly overwhelmed, Elena put out a hand to steady herself against the kitchen counter. That casserole must've been tuna; the fishy smell caused her to gag. Flinging open the trash can lid, she frantically tore out the bag, which immediately dumped its contents from the bottom.

Refuse splayed across the floor; particularly noticeable were the coiled noodles and moist, paste-gray tuna of the casserole she'd correctly identified. When all had settled, Elena stared at the cans and coffee grounds, the used tissues and fruit peels and egg shells and the sheer magnitude of the mess. The revolting stench and the prospect of touching all of it absolutely exhausted her. Unable to swallow the lump welling up in her throat, the woman shuddered into broken sobs. She let fall the despoiled bag, which whispered to the floor like the husk of some insect's sloughed shell, and dropped to her knees, unable to remain steady on them. For some moments, Elena wept loud and ugly, reason having left her. She picked at bits of unidentifiable fabric amongst the pile, lifted up a filter and watched the black sludge drip from it. Her deep, heaving breaths were the only sound, closing her into an echo chamber reverberating the terrible grief she was unsure she could bear. How could she carry on? How could she pass through time when every second without her boy was another needle in her flesh? She wished she were dead, unfeeling. To feel was to agonize, now. It meant only pain.

The foil lid of the split casserole gleamed beneath the kitchen lights, sharp and mottled. The fishy smell inundated her once more, and Elena retched. One thing at a time, she told herself, sealing her nostrils and preventing the vomit. One thing at a time. Perfunctory tasks. Routine. Robotic.

Leaning toward the cabinet beneath the sink, she opened it and retrieved a new trash bag. From her position, she managed to balloon it and began gingerly transferring bits and pieces from the floor to the bag. Had she been less weary, she might've thought to grab a broom and dustpan, but her head felt too heavy to be sensible. Her nose had begun to run, and her vision blurred from the warm liquid continuing to seep from her lids, but she managed to make a bit of mindless progress before reaching for the casserole cover. The sharp metal lining drew blood from one of her fingertips, though in her state of mind, Elena didn't notice and wouldn't have cared even if she had, because when she picked up the dish, a sheaf of glossy newsprint peeled itself from the bottom and plopped onto the top of the pile. It was an ad from the local paper, The Surette Gazette (which Elena had never asked for and hadn't once read), one of those inserts which had probably fallen out when she'd tossed the paper in the trash, and at first she thought nothing of it.

The moment her hand touched the paper when she picked it up to deposit it in the trash bag, though, static prickled through her fingers, up her arms and neck, and into her jaw. The sensation came upon her gradually rather than all at once, but even so, she recognized it as meaningful and unfurled the ad to actually look at it.

Jericho's Bait n' Tackle! shouted big words in bright red across the front. The sepia-toned image portrayed what Elena guessed was a shop, though it looked rather more like a very small house attached to a wooden-planked dock, looking out over tree-canopied water. Fishing and boating equipment was propped against and around the building. More lettering was beneath the image, noting items for sale and their prices as well as an address and phone number. Really, there was nothing quite compelling about the advertisement, and yet for the first time in months, Elena believed portent spoke to her. What exactly it said, she didn't know, only that there was something about this advertisement, or about the place itself . . .

A phone call went unanswered, so forgetting the mess in her kitchen, the woman hastily gathered her wallet and keys and went out into the rain.

The shop was difficult to find. Elena had never been in the part of Surette to which Google Maps took her. The town curved like a "C" around the water, and her sub-division was right in the middle of it. The houses she'd been cleaning were at one end, and Jericho's Bait n'Tackle seemed to be at the other. The dwellings and establishments grew less promising as she drew nearer her destination. Elena noticed the upcropping of cheaper shops: holes-in-the-wall and liquor stores and thrift barns. And once she'd passed the commercial part of town and entered residential streets, her hands found themselves tightening around the steering wheel. She'd thought she and her boys were struggling, but whoever lived in this tail end of Surette surely wanted for more than she did.

Not many people were out, and surely the rain had something to do with that. Even though it'd let up somewhat, everything was soaked and mushy, and it was only a matter of time before the clouds opened up once again. Houses were tiny, most in need of rehab in more than just aestehtics, and many had rusting boats or random vehicles parked outside of them. Lawncare didn't seem to be a consideration anywhere, and weeds grew up as tall as her car on the sides of the gravel road Elena at last turned down. She listened to her tires crunch against the rocks and wondered whether her app had led her astray. The trees and shrubbery were wild and unkempt, closing out the sky overhead, and the road itself was too narrow to turn around on. After some moments of slow and perplexed driving, Elena began to fear she'd have to back out the bumpy distance she'd come, when all at once the canopy opened and a clearing widened to reveal the same shop she'd seen in the ad.

And yet, it wasn't the same at all.

Elena parked right in front of the ramshackle wooden building and got out of her car. Holding up the paper, she looked from it to the actual place, and her heart sank. There was no way the advertisement in her hands was recent. Even if it'd fallen out of that week's newspaper, even if it was dated last Wednesday, the abandoned, broken-down shack in front of her couldn't possibly be the Jericho's Bait n'Tackle in the picture. The wooden dock had sunk into the mud; the black bayou waters had risen over some of the sagging and broken planks. The building had collapsed in on itself and, like the dock, was in danger of being swallowed up by the reedy swamp around it. Surely no one had carried on business in there for months if not years.

The woman was unsure whether she should be disappointed. Had someone (this "Jericho" of the ad, perhaps) been there, what might she have said to them? Well, she'd probably have asked whether they knew anything about her boy, as ludicrous as that now sounded. The old man in the image surely couldn't have known anything, all the way over on this side of town.

Still, something had drawn her here, she was sure of it. Even now as she stood looking out into the knotty trunks and creepers along the banks, as she studied the high waters, she sensed what only a mother could sense: the enduring presence of her child. Elena knew her grief had made her irrationally hopeful, and yet not until now had she felt so absolutely positive that Eddie was still alive! This place, there was some aura about it, about the rippling moss-infused waters, the weeping trees and secret wildlife. As a drizzle began to fall from the sky once again, Elena called her boy's name past the dilapidated shack, past the dock, out across the river, and from her vantage point, she realized, she could see in the foggy distance the large estate houses of the other end of town, peeking here and there through their tree-infested burrows.

"Who are you lookin' for?"

At the sound of the strange little voice, Elena whipped about so quickly she stumbled and nearly fell. Behind her was a hunched old woman, dressed in shapeless clothing and muddied sandals. She held a blue umbrella over her head of thick white hair.

"No need to be so surprised, dear," the stranger said, approaching and standing beside Elena. "I live just a bit away, saw you driving that road and wanted to make sure you were all right. No one's come this way in a long time."

Elena caught herself staring silently and understood how she must look. "I'm sorry," she spoke through the mist, her breaths weaving between raindroplets. An explanation momentarily escaped her, but then she held up the dampened advertisement. "I'm looking for—for Jericho, I guess. The ad—"

"He's not here, not now," the old woman interrupted. Her gaze shifted toward the waters, to some distant point across the way, and Elena noticed one of the woman's eyes was cloudy, possibly blind. "We were supposed to be here, together, but he couldn't make it."

A movement by the bank caught Elena's eye; she glimpsed a bird with a snaky purplish neck and stick legs wading through the rain-pocked water, dipping its beak every so often as it presumably sought food. It took no notice of the two humans.

"You aren't looking for him, anyhow," the old woman suddenly added, turning back to Elena. "You're looking for your boy."

It wasn't a question but a statement, and something caught in Elena's throat. "Do you know anything about him? I—feel him, here. I sense him . . ."

"It is a darkness which may be felt, my dear, an evil with no remedy." Seeing Elena's pained bewilderment, the old woman shook her head, bared gray teeth, sighed, "Who knows what's down in these swamps? Older'n you or I, older'n time itself."

Elena might have asked more, had she been able to gather her thoughts before the old woman waddled off into the trees and vanished from her sight, eschewing the road for whatever paths of her own she'd forged. In the sudden vacuum, Elena began to wonder whether she'd imagined the strange old woman. She stood a few moments longer in attempt to comprehend what she'd heard, what she continued to feel, standing there immersed in the bayou, but nothing clarified itself for her, and at length, she ruefully returned to her car and made the drive home.

Her thoughts distracted her; the weather forced caution. So when Elena did at last reach her house, she paid little attention to the car parked on the street beside her mailbox until she'd exited her own sedan and approached the front porch. Only when she was startled by a looming figure standing at her door did she recoil with a gasp. Of all the people she might have expected to arrive for a visit, she'd never have guessed the impeccably dressed, tragically perfet man before her.

A surge of entirely unwelcome emotion claimed Elena.

"What have you done to my son?"

"Jonathan," she squeaked, her voice as creaky as the old woman's had been. "Why don't you come inside, out of the rain?"