I have so much homework I need to do so this isn’t going to be a long one but I realized something today.

Tilly and I have both been doing just what we promised and keeping a low profile, mostly because neither of us know what to do next.

I got lunch with Tilly and Erica today and apparently Erica went to Serena Wiley’s Halloween party because she was talking about it all the way to the Wendy’s and she said, “I’m so glad Serena got all weird and decided not to go to NYU because that girl throws the best fucking parties.”

And then Tilly said, “Is she doing better?” and as Erica explained that yeah Serena was much more like her old self lately I had a slow realization about something.

Serena Wiley woke up in the woods. She was Tilly’s older sister Caitlin’s best friend — Serena got into NYU and Caitlin got into Colombia. They were so excited about going to the east coast together and then over spring break something happened to Serena. I never heard what happened, just that she was supposed to go to some internship or something and when she she came back she just wasn’t Serena anymore. She quit cheer and student council. She wore sweats every day. She gave up her spot at NYU and went to Western instead. She and Caitlin fell out. No one saw it coming. One day she was Miss Black Lake, town darling, the next she was a strange, secretive ghost.

Sound familiar?

And then, right there in the back of the car, I remembered something.

I pulled out my phone, scrolled back to the photo of the list of check-ins at that seedy ass motel in Seattle and right there on the page:

She was there. She knows something.

I didn’t get to talk to Tilly at school so I called her after and she came to the same conclusion I did. She said she’d call Serena tonight or tomorrow.