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QTHERESURRECTION: How was the party?
ITWASAKIDNEYINFECTION: Lame, of course. Every party I go to is
lame.
QTHERESURRECTION: Sorry I missed it. You’re up early. Want to
come over, play Resurrection?
ITWASAKIDNEYINFECTION: Are you kidding?
QTHERESURRECTION: uh . . . no?
ITWASAKIDNEYINFECTION: Do you know what day it is?
QTHERESURRECTION: Saturday May 15?
ITWASAKIDNEYINFECTION: Bro, prom starts in eleven hours and
fourteen minutes. I have to pick Lacey up in less than nine hours. I
haven’t even washed and waxed RHAPAW yet, which by the way you did
a nice job of dirtying up. Then after that I have to shower and shave and
trim nasal hairs and wash and wax myself. God, don’t even get me
started. I have a lot to do. Listen, I’ll call you later if I have a chance.
Radar was on, too, so I IM’ed him.
QTHERESURRECTION: What is Ben’s problem?
OMNICTIONARIAN96: Whoa there, cowboy.
QTHERESURRECTION: Sorry, I’m just pissed that he thinks prom is
oh-so important.
OMNICTIONARIAN96: You’re going to be pretty pissed when you
hear that the only reason I’m up this early is that I really need to go
because I have to pick up my tux, aren’t you?
QTHERESURRECTION: Jesus Christ. Seriously?
OMNICTIONARIAN96: Q, tomorrow and the next day and the day

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after that and all the days for the rest of my life, I am happy to participate
in your investigation. But I have a girlfriend. She wants to have a nice
prom. I want to have a nice prom. It’s not my fault that Margo Roth
Spiegelman didn’t want us to have a nice prom.
I didn’t know what to say. He was right, maybe. Maybe she deserved to be
forgotten. But at any rate, I couldn’t forget her.
My mom and dad were still in bed, watching an old movie on TV. “Can I
take the minivan?” I asked.
“Sure, why?”
“Decided to go to prom,” I answered hurriedly. The lie occurred to me as I
told it. “Gotta pick out a tux and then get over to Ben’s. We’re both going stag.”
My mom sat up, smiling.
“Well, I think that’s great, hon. It’ll be great for you. Will you come back so
we can take pictures?”
“Mom, do you really need pictures of me going to prom stag? I mean, hasn’t
my life been humiliating enough?”
She laughed.
“Call before curfew,” my dad said, which was midnight.
“Sure thing,” I said. It was so easy to lie to them that I found myself
wondering why I’d never much done it before that night with Margo.
I took I-4 west toward Kissimmee and the theme parks, and then passed I-Drive
where Margo and I had broken into SeaWorld, and then took Highway 27 down
toward Haines City. There are a lot of lakes down there, and wherever there are
lakes in Florida, there are rich people to congregate around them, so it seemed an
unlikely place for a pseudovision. But the Website I’d found had been very
specific about there being this huge parcel of oft-foreclosed land that no one had
ever managed to develop. I recognized the place immediately, because every
other subdivision on the access road was walled in, whereas Quail Hollow was
just a plastic sign hammered into the ground. As I turned in, little plastic posters
read FOR SALE, PRIME LOCATION, and GREAT DEVELOPMENT

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OPPORTUNITIE$!
Unlike the previous pseudovisions, someone was keeping up Quail Hollow.
No houses had been built, but the lots were marked with surveying stakes, and
the grass was freshly mown. All the streets were paved and named with road
signs. In the subdivision’s center, a perfectly circular lake had been dug and then,
for some reason, drained. As I drove up in the minivan, I could see it was about
ten feet deep and several hundred feet in diameter. A hose snaked across the
bottom of the crater to the middle, where a steel-and-aluminum fountain rose
from the bottom to eye level. I found myself feeling thankful the lake was empty,
so I wouldn’t have to stare into the water and wonder if she was in the bottom
somewhere, expecting me to put on scuba gear to find her.
I felt certain Margo could not be in Quail Hollow. It abutted too many
subdivisions for it to be a good place to hide, whether you were a person or a
body. But I looked anyway, and as I idled down the streets in the minivan, I felt
so hopeless. I wanted to be happy that it wasn’t here. But if it wasn’t Quail
Hollow, it would be the next place, or the one after that, or the one after that. Or
maybe I’d never find her. Was that the better fate?
I finished my rounds, finding nothing, and headed back toward the highway. I
got lunch at a drive-thru and then ate as I drove out west toward the minimall.

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