Ovenshine

6.

The top floor of DuBois Building is an abandoned attic that was once an extra space for equipment storage, before the newer media building was built across the street. Indy comes there alone sometimes, when the dorm's too cramped, the library's too loud, and she has enough stamina to stand the dust. There is something about the old wood and cloudy windows, wind creaking through their seams, that offer a unique sort of solace.

Usually. But now her three closest friends are gathered here—Percy partially turned towards one of the windows, Gatz perched on the edge of an abandoned cardboard box, Sylvia with her back to the door as if ready to split at any time—all staring at her.

Gatz drops their face into their hands, the fingers of which, like always, are speckled with bright paint. "Can I just say what everyone is thinking?"

Percy grunts his agreement, moving his gaze towards the window. "Let's hear it."

Gatz raises their eyebrows. "This, right here, is some white people shit."

"Amen," Sylvia agrees.

"Syl," Indy says. "Seriously?"

"I'm just saying. First of all, I never would've found that book in the first place because the fuck I look like breaking into an old murder scene?" Sylvia says, gesturing wildly, her nails darts of pink as her hands slice and move through the air. "Second of all, the second—the second—some creepy ass ghost wrote me a message, that book is getting destroyed, burned, tossed in the fucking Chesapeake. Are you kidding me, Indy?"

"Hm," Percy says. "Sounds a lot like what I said."

"I get it," Gatz offers, catching, likely, the dismayed look on Indy's face. "You want to help. That's who you are, Indy, and all of us appreciate you for that. But is this—I don't know, whatever this is—worth your wellbeing? Worth your life? What happens if they take you to jail for this?"

"I won't let it come to that."

Gatz frowns. "I'm not sure that sort of thing is in your control. You've already broken one law."

"So you don't believe me, then," Indy says. She takes the journal from her bag again, tossing it to the middle of the floor. They all watch the pages flutter and flutter, settling naturally where Dobbs's ghost left this morning's message. Out of the corner of her eye, Indy notices Sylvia shudder. "You don't believe that this message wasn't there before, and that Elizabeth Dobbs must've been the one who left it."

She's speaking to all of them, but her eyes are on Percy.

Indy waits, the silence creeping along her skin. Her friends shift their weight, glance at the floor. No one objects.

"Humor me, then," Indy says, folding her arms. "That's all I'm asking. Until the project's over, give or take, let's pretend it's really Dobbs that wrote this, and let's pretend that Pine really has been innocent this whole time. You don't have to do more than that. Just pretend."

Sylvia chews her lip, looking at Gatz, who looks at Percy.

Percy shakes his head, taking his baseball cap and twisting it backwards, as if he just needed to give his hands something to do. "Of course we have to do more than that," he says. Finally, he turns from the window, walking to the attic's center, the floor creaking beneath his weight as he does. He bends, plucking the journal from the floor. In his hands, it looks much smaller, much lighter. "We can't leave you to do all this by yourself. You'll end up doing stupid shit, like breaking into old houses."

Indy smirks, rife with an anxious relief. "You're never going to let me live that one down, are you?"

"Absolutely not."