Once I left the French Quarter, signs of life went from slim to none. The conditions of houses significantly worsened after I crossed Esplanade Avenue—the change was so sudden it almost seemed purposely engineered. The Faubourg Marigny was a neighborhood where immigrants had originally settled to build homes and chase the American Dream. In more recent years, artists and bohemian types had taken over here because it was cheaper than other parts of the city but still well located. Post-Storm, one could argue whether it was really so well located—in between the Mississippi River and the Industrial Canal.

Pre-Storm, the Faubourg Marigny had been one of the most colorful parts of the city, literally. The cultural diversity of its inhabitants brought a distinct flavor to each one of the old Creole cottages. Chartreuse, orange, magenta—pick any crayon from the box and you could have found it here. Now it felt like I was looking at everything through a dirty gray lens. Rust and mold were the new accent colors, and the neighborhood was more akin to a junkyard: tricycles, hi-tops, ceiling fans, and bunk beds were sprinkled on the lawns. The contents strewn about varied from block to block, but every street looked exactly the same, like it had drowned and then been left out to bake and rot in the Indian summer sun. Flipped cars and boats, some smashed into houses and storefronts, became commonsight. The sidewalk lifted in various places, reminding me of colliding tectonic plates from seventh-grade science.

A cloud of flies swarmed an overturned refrigerator, and an accidental glimpse of the maggot-infested mystery meat spilling out made me gag uncontrollably. I tried to move away quickly, but there were still puddles the size of ponds and no clear paths. I took a giant step, barely avoiding a drowned rat, and said a quiet thank-you for my shit-kickers.

A bad feeling crept up as my school came into view. All the windows of the old converted-factory building were blown out. I approached the nearest one and peered in: a foot of stagnant water still filled the ground level. My heart sank.

The warm, familiar feeling I usually had on campus was replaced with that strange sense of trespassing. A piece of paper inside a plastic sheath was nailed to the front door:

New Orleans School of Arts

Closed—Indefinitely

Contact the office of the

School Board Superintendent

for current status updates.

Despite the official stamp on the paper, there was something so unofficial about the posting that it looked piteous: the handwriting, the nail. For the first time in my life, the lack of bureaucracy made me uncomfortable. School and bureaucracy went hand in hand.

I snapped a photo and texted it to Brooke, adding only a sad face.

NOSA, as the student body called it, was an audition-only arts high school where we were taught that creativity was in everything, even in trigonometry, which I struggled to believe. After my audition, my father had sat me down and very seriously explained that the greatest lesson an artist could learn was how to deal with rejection. I think the day I got my acceptance letter was the best day of both our lives.

Now I wondered if this would be it for NOSA.

As I approached the corner where I'd normally see my father's beautiful ballerina sculpture, I braced myself for the possibility that she'd be mangled, vandalized, or missing altogether. He'd donated the sculpture for the school's fortieth anniversary. She was who I'd hidden behind, crying, after Johnnie West robbed me of my very first kiss during a scene-study class freshman year. She was the one who'd always listened to my nervous banter before my juried exams. I'd grown attached to seeing her every morning.

"Thank God!"

I nearly skipped when I saw her still midpirouette; her metal tutu, thin as paper, still creating that amazing sense of movement. Even the mask that covered the top half of her face was still intact—a metal version of those traditionally worn during Mardi Gras. She'd always been one of my favorite pieces of my dad's, and now she glimmered bronze against the sad spectrum of gray, almost begging me not to worry. I would have hugged her if she hadn't been smeared in rotting foliage.

At least I'd have some good news for my father—his work withstood the strength of the Storm.

My dad sometimes taught metalsmithing workshops, although not at NOSA; they weren't too keen on allowing students to use blowtorches. Lucky for me, he'd been teaching me the art of harnessing fire since age six, after I snuck into his studio and burned off a pigtail (which gave me a very punk rock haircut for a summer and nearly gave him a stroke). No matter what lengths he took to childproof his work space, I'd always managed to get in and meddle. Teaching me to correctly use the tools was his way of being better safe than sorry.

My eyes teared at the thought of not being able to spend my junior and senior years at NOSA.

Adele, think about how much more other people lost.

I wiped my eyes and started the trek back.

***

Large orange Xs had been spray painted directly onto the exteriors of the now-abandoned old homes. I'd seen images of them on TV, but they were so much more upsetting in person. The numbers sprayed into each quadrant of the Xs indicated when the premises had been searched and how many dead bodies had been found. The dilapidated houses, formerly as vibrant as the Caribbean, encouraged me to flee, but I couldn't help but pause outside one house. Next to the X, a rescuer had taken the time to spray out the words:

1 DEAD IN ATTIC

The eeriness that poured out of every broken door and every broken window was suffocating.

Glass crunched under my feet as I walked away—it had come from the shattered window of the black town car parked next to me. There was a man in the driver's seat.

I froze and stammered, "Hello?"

He didn't stir.

I moved to see his face. His neatly groomed blond head was resting in the open window among a scattering of shiny glass fragments—his empty blue eyes looked straight through me.

"Sir? Sir, are you okay?" Southern hospitality took over, even though I knew there was only one explanation for the stillness of his body. I extended my hand toward his neck to check his pulse.

A bird squawked loudly. I yanked my arm back in fright and spun into a full-on sprint, barely aware that my hand had grazed the broken glass.

I ran through the remaining blocks of the Marigny, past Esplanade Avenue, and back into the French Quarter. I kept running until sucking in the humid air became so difficult I had to stop and lean against a brick wall.

Panting, I pulled out my cell phone and tapped the three numbers we were schooled never to dial except in case of a real emergency.

The sound of the busy signal made me burst into tears. How many other people were trying to call 9-1-1 at this exact moment? I'd never seen a dead body before, much less touched one. Now, all I could picture were those blue eyes. I felt his dead skin on my fingers. An asthmatic wheeze came from my throat.

Breathe, Adele.

Tears dripped.

I threw my arms over my head, determined to pull it together. I felt the air pump in and out of my lungs. Focus on something else.

But directly across the street, the imposing concrete wall surrounding the Old Ursuline Convent hid anything interesting to look at. My hand throbbed, and I felt liquid dripping down my arm, but before I could inspect it, a rattling noise caught my attention. I held my breath to create perfect silence and heard the noise again.

My throat tightened.

From my vantage point, all I could see were the five attic windows protruding from the slope of the convent roof. On one of them, a shutter had become detached and was hanging loosely, rattling in the wind.

I focused on the shutter as it methodically flapped open and snapped shut. Again. And again. But the man's dead blue eyes had stained my mind. What happened to him? A car accident? The rhythm of the knocking wood put me into a meditative state. My tears stopped, and my breathing evened. The claps gradually became louder, drawing my focus back to the window. Something seemed off.

A rusty smell pinched my nostrils, and only then did I realize the cut in my palm was bleeding profusely. I untied the sash from around my waist and wrapped it tightly around my hand. Back less than a day and I already have two injuries. Dad is going to freak. I silently mourned the death of the Chanel as the blood soaked through it.

Sweat dripped down my back. Gross. I tugged my dress and wiped the tears from my face with the back of my bandaged hand, all the while watching the attic window. The heat was incredible, rippling down my torso, almost feverish. Is it wrong to pray for a cool front? I wondered, staring at the convent. Maybe just a little breeze?

The shutter snapped back shut—and then I realized what was off.

I stood perfectly still. There was no breeze. The air was dead. Is someone pushing the shutter from the inside? It snapped open again, as if demanding my attention. No, the glass window behind it is shut.

My pulse picked up.

I squinted as the shutter flapped open and shut again, and I thought I saw a flash of movement behind the pane. What the hell? I blinked the remaining water from my eyelids.

When I looked back up, the shutter swung open.

Faint clinking sounds came from the convent courtyard, like metal raindrops hitting the pavement. Curious, I crossed the street and approached the convent's wrought iron gate, trying to keep my eyes on the dark window behind the shutter.

Through the iron bars, the overgrown garden looked as if it had been abandoned years ago, but then again, that was how most of the city looked at present. I reached for the ornate handle, but the fixture turned downward before I touched it. The loud clank made me jump back, and the gate creaked open just enough to let me through.

A little voice inside my head pleaded with me to bail, but instinct led me through the maze of dead hedges as if I'd been there a hundred times before. My eyes went back to the window and refused to look away. As I drew closer, the wooden shutter continued to open and close—slowly and precisely. Once I was directly underneath, I could see the nails popping out of the adjoining shutter. I glanced at my feet. The ground was covered in long black carpenter nails—clearly the work of a blacksmith, not a modern machine. Was it really necessary to use so many nails to secure the shutters? A tiny raindrop hit my face.

The shutter flapped twice more. Faster and faster. It was slowly pulling itself off the building. Only a single stake in the center hinge kept it from falling, but it too protruded as if being pulled by some invisible force. The cut on my hand throbbed; the blood had soaked completely through the sash.

A clap of thunder made my pulse race, but still my feet wouldn't carry me away. I stood motionless, neck craned, watching the shutter wrench itself free until it was suspended by just the very tip of the stake.

For a brief moment, the world seemed to freeze.

Then gravity prevailed.

My arms flew over my head as the dangling shutter crashed three stories to the ground—just a few inches from my feet.

The speed with which the sky became dark felt wholly unnatural. Bigger droplets of rain began to fall. Too stunned to move, I tried to make sense of what had just happened.

Suddenly, the remaining wooden shutter slammed open, and the windowpane blew outward in an explosion of showering glass. I fell to the ground, curling into a tight ball, shielding my face as a whoosh of wind whipped around me and a loud whistle faded into what sounded like sardonic laughter.

And then there was absolute silence.

This is not happening right now. This is a dream.

With my tense arms still wrapped around my head, I peeked out with one eye. The thick iron stake that had held the shutter rolled along the cement toward my face, as if pulled by magnetic force. It stopped right before it touched my nose.

I quickly sat up and grabbed it. The metal felt strangely powerful in my hand, a giant nail twice the width of my palm.

I looked around—even though my eyes told me I was alone, my gut told me I wasn't. Every ounce of my being screamed, Get out! Now I really was trespassing, and on the private grounds of the archdiocese.

Another crack of thunder made me scramble to my feet and bolt back through the garden.

The iron gate banged shut behind me, just as the chapel bells clanged.