Years later, when her sister’s laugh returned to her like a tide coming back into its bay, Mara still kept a small notebook under her pillow. On the cover, in her own careful hand, she had written the only string she vowed never to type: wwwxnxn. It was a warning, a memory, a thing she had learned the hard way — that to stare too long at the hinge between what is and what almost is is to risk being unmoored from both. wwwxnxn
