The night is cool on her skin. Tiff steps out into it from the complicated side door of Denny's car. She drags her bag out with her, picks Kepler up like he's a toddler, then turns to see Denny in the driver's seat. Before she can chicken out, she says what she has been chewing on for the past few minutes. "I'm going to skip school tomorrow. Do you want to research with me?"

Denny gives her a tired sigh. "Christ, Tiff. Don't skip school. You're smarter than that."

"Well, you already said that you were taking the day off tomorrow, so why shouldn't I come with you? And what would you even be doing?"

"Being sick. At home. By myself." Denny speaks a little too quickly for someone who plans out their sickness in advance.

Tiff narrows her eyes. "Doesn't your mom work from home?"

"Not tomorrow, she doesn't. And maybe I'll be in the woods. You don't know."

"I'm not sure if there's any way you could keep me from this. Even if I did go, I wouldn't be paying attention. I would just be thinking really hard about all this because there's a ghost to find and put to rest and, I'm sorry, but I don't think I can sit in Dual-Enrollment-slash-AP Physics 2 and pay attention to my balsa wood bridge made with blue glue when I know that there's a possibility that people are in danger and I could do something to stop it. Don't tell me I need to back off or do something else or 'be a kid.' I'm seventeen. I'm almost an adult. I can make decisions about things."

"Neither of us know how to make decisions," Denny frowns. "None of us do. That's part of the issue of the two of us working together on this. And don't yell, Jessie is asleep."

Tiff doesn't really care that Jessie really is sleeping in the passenger's seat. She shrugs; Kepler squirms in her arms.

Denny rubs the bridge of her nose. "Come on, Tiff, don't skip school."

"No."

"Come on."

"I'm going to do what I'm going to do. You can help me or you can hinder me, but you sure as hell can't stop me." Tiff doesn't say anything else or give Denny the chance to speak. Jaw jutting just a little, she trudges her way up to the front door of the house.

Her aunt moved here when she was Tiff's age. For some reason, nobody asked questions about why a seventeen-year-old was trying to get a house across the country from where her family lived. There was an old man living here who died under suspicious circumstances and had his face eaten by a seemingly spontaneously-spawning mass of cats. Serendipity won out, it would seem, and Auntie Esther got a two-bedroom, one-bathroom house. It's essentially just a mobile home that somebody plopped down and added onto on a whim.

Though Tiff wants to head straight for the shed out back, which she converted into a bedroom for herself, she knows that now isn't the time for research and tinkering. Her aunt asked her not to sneak around anymore. (She also asked Tiff not to spend time on the roof, but Tiff doesn't really listen to that.)

Still, Tiff can oblige. She can be accommodating. She can act like people want her around even when they definitely don't.

She fishes her keys out of one of the pockets of her bag. Before this set was nerve-wrackingly made at one of those Walmart machines that let her print them to look like a collection of stars and supernovas, Tiff had other ways of getting into the house. Mostly, she just went through the window of Drew's room, where she had been sleeping until he moved back home. The lock there is faulty and she knows how to pop open the screen from the outside using a butterknife.

With rickety steps under her feet, she thinks about what it would take to fix all the broken parts of this place. That's a project for a different day, though. Maybe she'll tackle it over the summer, if she gets the time.

Inside the house, there are records of a life that Tiff has only just begun to live. Things were different back in Florida. Her family lived in East Orlando for the last few years she was there, in part of a four-plex sandwiched between fraternities. The walls were disgraced with stiff family photos, pictures of White Mormon Jesus (for some reason), and a single image of Andy from when he was in Kindergarten; the bookshelves were lined with scriptures and copies of the magazines and pamphlets printed by her parents' church in Fort Reverence. Everything was perfectly in its place.

In contrast, the gentle chaos of her aunt's house is unabashed. A mountain of shoes in the closet behind the door threaten to spill out any time someone so much as looks at the knob. The living room is lived-in: green pull-out couch against the wall and a coffee table stacked high with coasters, books, magazines, VHS tapes, and DVDs. In the pictures of Drew on the wall, he is happy. His arms are around his friends or holding trophies, or he stands next to his mother with teeth beaming pride and joy to the unwitting viewer.

There aren't any pictures of Tiff. She hasn't asked yet, and she probably never will. It's not like she belongs here, anyway.

That doesn't matter, though. It's late enough that she doesn't really trust anything she thinks about herself, even if it's objectively true. The voice in the back of her head telling her to run off and move to a state where nobody has heard of her (like Kansas or something) should just be quiet.

Tiff pauses just inside the door to take off her shoes. She keeps them in here because she knows that Kepler can't use a doorknob. If she leaves them out instead of putting them in the closet or on a shelf, he picks apart all the threads and rips apart the aglets with his intelligent little ratman fingers. At the very least, she has a pair of dollar-store flip-flops she wears to trudge through the backyard. Auntie Esther told her she isn't allowed to be barefoot out there anymore, not after she stepped on that nail. They're not exactly lab safe, but it's not like she wears goggles either.

There are people sitting at the kitchen table. She can see them out of the corner of her eye while she's trying to unzip her boot. The teeth are coming off and making the whole process harder than it should be.

"I'm home," she calls. "I know I said I might not be, but I am!"

"We're in here, honey!" her aunt calls back.

Tiff holds her bag in her left hand, dangling it by the strap. She slings it over the back of the couch to the seat, where she knows she's going to forget about it.

The yellow light of the ceiling breast illuminates the kitchen like the warm spoils of a comfort war. Aunt Esther sits at the table with someone Tiff finds familiar but doesn't quite recognize. She's wearing a warm smile and the strong Cain family resemblance. Aunt Esther has the same hair color as Tiff's mom, though she has bleached her hair blonde and neglected to touch up the roots.

Ruth Sheridan never cut or altered her hair. She didn't let Tiff cut hers, either. Well, the joke's on her. They may have the same nose and propensity for freckles, but Tiff refuses to become her mother. She cut off all her hair when she got here, and she did it again on Christmas Eve after she got back from having a breakdown and punching a tree in the snowy woods. Ruth Sheridan will not have a hold on her anymore.

Or maybe she will. Maybe acting in direct opposition to her is still a way of giving in to that control. It's food for thought, and Tiff doesn't want to bite.

There is another person at the table. She's shorter than Tiff is-- short, plump, and curvy, with frizzy, naturally-blonde hair streaked through with peach and pink. The sleeves of her black cable-knit sweater fall over her wrists and hands as she picks at a brownie from a plate between the two women. To the right of her restless hands, there is a yellow legal pad and a black pen. To the left, there is an audibly-whirring tape recorder. Tiff tries not to notice it or wonder why she hasn't stopped the recording.

"Uh-- Hi." Tiff looks only briefly at the unexpected woman. "Auntie Esther, who is this?"

"Tiff, this is Suzette Sweet. She's in town, doing a-- What was it, Suzette, a podcast?"

Suzette nods sagely. "Correct. I'm doing a podcast about your local folklore and political climate."

"Oh. Yeah, okay, now that I know who you are, I know who you are."

She does. That isn't a lie, for once. Suzette Sweet is the host of Sweet Nothings, which is a podcast Tiff would listen to religiously if she were all that into podcasts. She puts it on when she's out in the woods and has nothing else to listen to.

The host is a skeptic at heart; she believes that all folklore is fiction informed by some sort of cultural reality or phenomenon. Tiff knows she doesn't have to lie to her. That doesn't mean she has to tell the truth.

"Suzette," Esther asks, "do you mind if we take a quick break from this interview? I haven't seen her all day and I'd like to get caught up before she heads off to bed."

"Who says I sleep?" Tiff chuckles. She grabs an old glass from the cabinet before she remembers that she doesn't want to drink the water. She turns around after setting the cup down on the edge of the sink, leaning on her hands against the counter.

Auntie Esther rolls her eyes good-naturedly. "That's Tiff for you."

"You know, I think this is a great time to take a break, Ms. Cain. Do you have a bathroom?" Suzette stops the recorder as soon as she finishes her question.

"Of course. It's just down the hall. Mind the flooring, it's tricky."

"Thank you kindly." Suzette's voice is smooth, controlled-- like there's a smile waiting in the wings but it has to wade through some margarine first.

When she's gone, Tiff turns partially to her. With divided attention, she reaches down to get the bottle of apple juice out from the fridge's bottom shelf. "What's with the sudden podcast appearance?" she asks, like it means nothing at all.

"She's doing a story--" Her aunt squints into the air, trying to figure out, "Is that the right word? A story?"

"An episode, probably?" Tiff shrugs, flicking the cap of the bottle. "I don't know."

"She's doing an episode on Fort Reverence."

Tiff pauses the juice pour. "Oh. Why?"

"The church, Tiff."

"Oh. Yeah, I guess that is notable, in a study-of-religion kinda way." Tiff winces.

Aunt Esther stands up from the kitchen table and joins her niece at the fridge. She is like metal: strong and steadfast, but forgiving and malleable. Tiff isn't afraid of that today. Leaning around the door of the fridge, her aunt decides, "Let's not dwell on the cult we were raised in, huh? How was your day?"

"Fine! We did reviews for some tests tomorrow." Tiff realizes with a jolt that Denny was right. She can't skip school-- not until after sixth period, at least. At that point, it isn't even worth it. Still, she rambles, "We reviewed for physics and calculus, and then I did my presentation on Emma. It went... well."

"Did it?" Esther pries.

"No, it went bad-- and I hate Emma anyway! I just-- Oh, I don't like that book! It's so boring! I get that it's a classic and all, I do, but it really just... That's the only word I can think of for it. Boring."

Aunt Esther, still leaning into the fridge, moves something from the top to the bottom shelf. "You can't just read about science, folklore, and Bigfoot. There must be a balance in all things."

Tiff sips at her apple juice and holds out the bottle. Her aunt takes it and returns it to the door. "Sounds like someone is enjoying their Star Wars novelizations," she jokes. "And it's not just those three things. I also read about the law. And cults, even though that makes me sad. And I read those Berrycloth comics, too, remember?"

"Those were about Bigfoot, Tiff," Esther points out. She emerges from the fridge with a Tupperware of white rice and grilled chicken from the back of the second shelf. "I set aside some of dinner for you, since you got home a little later than expected. You want me to warm it up?"

"Yes, please. Do we have ketchup?"

"We're a family of White Floridians, of course we have ketchup." Aunt Esther grabs the bottle from the door and slaps it down on the counter. "So, what's all this about hunting a ghost? This isn't like you trying to get into Jaded Paradise to look at the stage, is it? You know you can tell me if you're gay, right?"

"I'm not trying to get in there right now, if that's what you mean. It's water-based." Absent-mindedly, Tiff taps the faucet next to her, then sticks her head in the cabinet under the kitchen sink. Nothing happens. "Something to do with the water. Maybe someone drowned?"

"Oh, I hope not. You know, we had a girl drown a few years back? Before you moved here? Frightening stuff."

"Yeah, I know. The Other Tiff. I know."

Like what happened in the Sheridan household two years ago, the drowning of Tiffany Summers isn't something that she wants on her mind. It always brings the mood down. If there's one thing Tiff can't stand, it's a dampened mood.

It's hard not to see herself as a replacement, in a way. As someone wrongfully taking the Other Tiff's place. As the faulty follow-up to a perfect prototype. As the knockoff toy.

Is it a coincidence that the Other Tiff dies and then, some time later, a different Tiffany S. shows up, and she's worse in every conceivable way? What kind of burden would that put on everyone else who knew and loved her? Of course she is missed. Of course she is survived by her loved ones, friends, and peers. Of course parents warn their children not to do what she did, whisper their fears by the shores of the lake or the edge of a bathtub or wherever. Lake Wonder loves to warn everyone about its dead girls. The fact remains that Tiff Sheridan is a horrible replacement for Tiffany Summers, and everyone knows it.

The microwave beeps, snapping her out of the Tiff singularity.

Aunt Esther is the one to get the food out of the box; Aunt Esther is the one to put it in Tiff's empty, upturned hands; Aunt Esther is the one who breaks the momentary silence.

"Honey, Suzette is out of the bathroom," she says, gingerly, audibly confused about the shift in mood. "You're welcome to stick around and talk about Fort Reverence with us, if you want?"

Tiff shakes her head a little too quickly.

Aunt Esther is, of course, right. From the doorway of the kitchen, Suzette speaks with her melting-margarine voice. "I would love your insight, Tiff."

"I'm not sure I have anything meaningful to say." Tiff puts a little too much ketchup on her rice.

"Do you mind?" Suzette crosses the room to press a button on her recorder. It starts whirring again. "Tiff, feel free to take a seat."

"No thank you," she says, a little too quickly. "I have homework to do."

She can think of how it would go. They would just talk about the church, and how it was horrible-- and Auntie Esther can more than cover that. She probably has better things to say than Tiff does, anyway. If there's a time to be vulnerable, this definitely isn't it. Tiff stirs the ketchup into her rice a little more.

Tiff really does have a lab report to finish, and calculus homework that she forgot to do during class because she was discreetly using her phone to research missing and murdered girls in Lake Wonder. She should probably pretend to be responsible, just like she's going to pretend that she has an appetite and pretend that she isn't a subpar addition to the lives of everyone around her.

With a hope that maybe she can manage to be responsible by virtue of faking it, Tiff leaves the house just as quickly as she came. She finds Kepler under the porch, between the ground and the gentle slope of the yard, where he went after she let him loose. Tiff tucks him under her arm and brings both rice and rat with her up the ladder to the roof.

Tiff looks up at the stars. Everything feels like it's falling apart when it's only just beginning, so she looks at the stars.

Something's out there, she knows. She tends not to think about aliens as much as she wants to, but even so, she knows something is looking back at her. It has to be out there: a great, infinite something.

For a moment, she thinks of the eyes she saw when she was face-down in the puddle. If there's one thing she knows, it's that the supernatural outs itself through the eyes. Oneiron, the elven king she defeated last year, proved that when his eyes were on fire. Eyes haunt her. Is it any wonder they showed up here, in this case?

Something howls out in the woods, breaking the pattern of thought. Maybe it's a werewolf. Maybe it's a normal wolf. Maybe it's something else entirely. Maybe it'll come and drag her away from Lake Wonder, where she was never supposed to be in the first place. She's a blight on this land. They would be right to do so.

No, no-- this is home. Ghosts be damned, this is home. Maybe she isn't from here, and the town itself doesn't accept this odd little outsider and her rambling tongue and so-called "religious trauma," but she counts it as her home.

Isn't that enough?