“The Bitter Cloud.” Ander’s smile was the opposite of William’s open grin. It was a smile at the border of weeping, a passport flashed and pocketed. It fascinated Eureka, and it frightened her to consider what it would mean to be Ander’s girlfriend, to combine her enormous pain with his, to become a power couple of loss. They would understand each other’s sorrow naturally—but who would lighten the mood?
“You’re as sad as I am,” she whispered. “Why?”
“I’m happier than I’ve ever been.”
It made Eureka wish she’d known Ander forever, that she had as many memories of him as he had gathered of her over the years.
She touched the bright white rock. The Bitter Cloud. If this was Solon’s cave, Eureka could see why he compared the travertine stone to a cloud. Even after Claire had revealed how solid it was, there was a lightness to the stone, like you could almost pass your fingers through it.
Eureka held out her torch and entered the cave. Her bad ear listened to the soft vibration of moth wings carrying her father behind her.
William saw his shadow stretching on the cave walls and drew closer to Eureka. “I’m afraid.”
Eureka had to set the example that love was bigger than fear. “I’m with you.”
The cave walls had a strange, mottled texture. Eureka held the torch near one. Her fingers tightened around the torch’s silver wand.
There must have been a thousand skulls arranged along the walls. Had they been former residents? Trespassers like her? An earlier Eureka might have shuddered at the sight. The girl she was now leaned closer to the wall, peered into a skinless, grinning face. She sensed that the skull had belonged to a woman. Its eye sockets were large and low and perfectly rounded. Its teeth were intact along its delicate jaw. It was beautiful. Eureka thought about how intensely she used to want to die, how she’d aspired to be like this woman. She wondered where this lovely skull’s soul had gone, and what pain it had left on earth.
She reached out. The skull’s cheekbones were icy.
Eureka drew away, and the skull blended into the larger design. It was like stepping away from a telescope on a starry night. The skulls were separated here and there by other types of bones: femurs, ribs, kneecaps. Eureka knew from her archaeological digs with Diana that this room would have set her mother’s mind spinning.
They walked deeper into the cave, Cat’s stiletto heels clicking on the stone. The torch lit the space only a few feet ahead of Eureka and a few feet behind, so the others had to stay close. Stalactites dripped from the ceiling, like giant frozen fingers thawing. Cat pressed on Eureka’s head to signal her to duck under a spear-shaped one.
Eureka tipped the torch in Cat’s direction. The light made her friend’s freckles stand out against her skin. She looked young and innocent—Cat’s two least favorite qualities—which made Eureka think of Cat’s parents, who would always see their daughter that way, even when Cat was sixty. She hoped Cat’s family was safe.
“Be-fri.” Eureka spoke her half of the heart-shaped best-friends puzzle-piece necklace she and Cat had won during a Cajun line-dancing contest at the Sugarcane Festival in ninth grade.
Cat automatically recited her half of the charm. “St-ends.” She swung her hip out like they were still there, dancing in New Iberia, past Main Street’s decorated storefronts, the fall night promising a new school year and football and cute boys with thick warm cardigans you could slide inside.
They didn’t wear the necklaces anymore, but every once in a while, Eureka and Cat performed the familiar call-and-response. It was a way of checking in, of saying I will always love you and You’re the only one who gets me and Thanks.
The cave smelled musty and ripe, the way Eureka’s garage had smelled after Hurricane Rita. Its floor was surprisingly smooth, as if it had been sanded down. It was quiet except for the sound of water dripping from the stalactites into root-beer-colored pools. Pale tadpoles darted to and fro.