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    “We have another half hour before the next train,” says Sean. “Do you want something to drink?”
    “Yes, please,” I say, still eyeing Frankenstein .
    “I’ll put some tea on.”
    He leaves, taking the book with him. He knows I have few scruples when I’m curious.
    While he’s out of the room, I look around. At the magazines piled neatly on the coffee table and the books stacked in order on the shelves. The house is tidy, but not pristine; it looks lived in. On the mantelpiece above the fire, lined up, are framed photographs. A younger Jonathan and a woman with blond hair on their wedding day. Baby Sean. Jonathan and Sean by the seaside. Sean and a group of boys in soccer shirts. There’s so much in Sean’s life that he leaves behind to come to us. He has given up a great deal, all that time he could be a normal kid, all that time he could spend with Lucy or his friends.
    I hear him come in behind me, the teacups clinking in his hands, but I don’t turn around. “Why do you come?” I ask quietly.
    I feel him approach, his voice by my ear. “Because he asked me to.”
    This is so surprising, I turn. I notice he hasn’t got any tea for himself, just milk. Sean loves cold milk.
    “Jonathan asked you to take his place?”
    Sean nods. “When he got too sick to work, he asked me to go instead. He didn’t know what kind of guardian another replacement might be. He worried you’d get someone who was unkind, who would tell the Weavers every time you did something wrong. Ophelia’s supposed to, but we both know she doesn’t, and Dad was afraid someone else might. He thought I was your best chance.”
    “That doesn’t seem fair, to ask you that when he was so ill and he knew you wouldn’t refuse.”
    “I could have refused.”
    I smile. “But you didn’t. You never would have.”
    “It’s not as bad as it sounds, anyway,” he adds. “He only asked me to come until he died. He said, ‘When I’m gone, you can quit if you want. But you might find you don’t want to leave her.’”
    “But you never quit.”
    “No,” he says, “I stayed.”
    I watch him with wide eyes.
    “Why?”
    “We should go,” he says, looking past me at the clock, “or we’ll miss the train. Drink your tea.”
    I want to push the question, but I don’t. My nerves feel wobbly, and I drink the tea quickly to soothe them.
    “Eva,” says Sean.
    The sound of my new name is thrilling, and I look up at him, my skin as hot as the tea.
    “I don’t agree with what they do to you,” he says. He lifts my wrist and turns it over to reveal the small, delicate stretch of skin where my tattoo will go. “But I like you a lot more than I hate this.” His fingers feel so light against my wrist, it might be my imagination. My pulse throbs faster under his thumb.
    “Don’t,” I say unsteadily, pulling my wrist away.
    He drops his hand. “I didn’t mean . . .”
    Of course he didn’t. Why would he have meant anything by it?
    “I know.” I force an easy smile, but it comes out a bit twisted. “I felt one of those static-shock things, that’s all.”
    He doesn’t point out how lame that sounds. “Okay,” he says simply, “ready to go?”
    It’s still light out when we get back to Windermere, the streaky pinkish-gold light that means the day is ending. The sky looks like it’s melting.
    I check my watch. It’s almost seven. It’s starting to get dark earlier. I shove my hands in the front pockets of my jeans to keep them warm. It’s not as easy as it used to be in my old jeans: these are new, in the skinny style that Amarra recently discovered.
    We turn the corner and are less than a hundred feet from the cottage when I feel Sean’s hand clamp down on my elbow.
    “Keep walking,” he says in my ear.
    “But—”
    An exasperated breath hisses through his teeth. “Do it.”
    I look quickly at his face. It’s completely calm. Wooden. Taking my cue, I try to hide my