Chapter 1
Glace, Michigan, didn't look like it had changed at all in Lysander's ten-year absence. This, to Lys, felt like bullshit, given that the town annually weathered brutal, frigid Lake Superior winters, and he did not.
He steered his truck down Main Street, marveling at how a decade of regular snow and ice hadn't seemed to even crack the asphalt while stress had etched permanent lines into his forehead. The sun illuminated a harbor that hugged a bright, clean strip of sand and saturation-blue water, while years of working in bleak metal rooms had sapped Lys of what little color he had. Plump, content clouds dotted the sky. Lys' clothes hung looser on his frame than when he first shipped off for boot camp, and the 20-hour drive from Charleston had left him grumpy. He took in the familiar sight of tourists cooing over handmade trinkets and eating freshly-churned ice cream, feeling like he was watching a reenactment rather than real life. Had this place always been the perfect Americana diorama, preserved behind glass, or was the glass Lys felt courtesy of the three deployments in four years, followed by another three years of rotating shiftwork in drab, windowless buildings?
A brightly colored chalkboard on his right signaled that he'd reached his destination. Thank God. He was starting to think making the drive in one go was a bad idea–he got broody when he was over tired. The board read "Crooked Path Tats" in bright pink, swirly letters framed by a splattering of occult imagery and smoky swirls–a stark contrast to the posh, clean storefront displays on either side. He parked his sign in front of the door that the sign propped open and stared into the interior, darkened by the sun's brilliance, as if it were a maw ready to swallow him whole.
He shook it away and hopped out of his truck, slamming the door a bit harder than necessary to chase away his nerves. He had been trained to fight fires in nuclear reactors aboard warships—hell, he had once, thanks to some dipshit who had messed up his maintenance and short-circuited a seawater pump. Lys could handle walking through the door of a shop owned by people who cared about him.
And yet Lys held his breath until he was inside.
The first thing he noticed was the quilted tapestries plastering the walls. They painted the space in loud iconography crafted from scraps–the progress pride flag, the Black Power fist, geometric swirls in the colors of the trans pride flag, and others Lys wasn't familiar with. A nearby display case housed a burning incense stick and mother goddess motifs, as if it weren't clear enough what sort of people ran the shop.
The rattling of a loose door handle caught Lys' attention. He turned towards the counter as a hulking bear of a man emerged from a closet labeled "Employees Only" with an industrial roll of toilet paper in one hand and a sack of hand soap in the other. The man did a double-take at the sight of Lys, bringing a dazzling smile from the depths of his thick beard—a smile Lys recognized from years of social media posts.
"Lysander fucking Lennox," the man said, setting the toiletries on the counter and stepping out around it. "How the hell are you, man?"
Lys gave a tired smile back and reached forward. "Hey, Mark."
The hulking man took Lys' hand and pulled him into a back-cracking hug that smelled faintly of grape-scented vape smoke. "Whoops." Mark chuckled, releasing Lys. "My bad."
"I appreciate it, actually," Lys replied, rotating his shoulders. '"That drive sucked."
"Yeah, but it was fast." Mark looked him over curiously. "Ambie said you'd be here tomorrow."
Lys shrugged. "I wanted it over and done with, so I kept driving."
"I'd better not hear who I think I hear," said a voice from the depths of the parlor. Lys craned his neck to watch Ambrosia Jones enter the lobby with a giant grin on her face. She pulled Lys in for a hug nearly as strong as her husband's, despite her wispy frame. Lys leaned into her willowy angles and the jingling of her layered jewelry, allowing the tension to melt out of his muscles.
"You're lucky you don't have a chain of command for me to call anymore," Ambrosia teased as she pulled away. "You know better than to drive more than eight hours like that, shipmate."
Lys snorted and rolled his eyes, then took a good look at his best friend, savoring the joyful glow beneath her dark skin and the light in her big black doe eyes. "You look good." He brushed a thumb along his jaw. "Surgery went okay? You didn't post pictures."
Ambrosia shrugged, hands resting on her slender hips. "Yeah. It was whatever. I healed fine. Hardly any scars."
Mark gave his wife a tired look.
She lightly slapped him in the arm for it. "Hush."
Lys looked to Mark, then back to Ambrosia. "What?"
"Nothing. My mom just drove over from Marquette the morning of surgery and tried to give me one more turn-back-to-God sermon. Tried to preach to the nurses helping me, too. They actually had to call security on her."
Lys jolted back and blinked in shock. "Jesus Christ, Am."
"Yeah, that's what she said, too." Ambrosia sighed as she lifted an immaculately manicured hand to massage her temple. "I tell you what, man. The world's gone crazy while you've been in. Even all the way out here."
Mark's expression soured. "Especially out here."
Before Lys could comment, a man hobbled from the hallway, wincing each time he put any weight on his left foot. Despite the man's pained grimace, Lys recognized him instantly as Joey Dubois, a former football star of Glace High, though what position he had played, Lys didn't remember. What he did remember was how those baby blue eyes and that winning grin made all the girls swoon. Hell, given how he looked now, he still probably did. He'd softened a bit with age, but the way his plain black T-shirt hugged him just right told Lys he still worked out regularly. The years had etched a few faint lines into his face, but they only made him look more distinguished.
Lys would be lying if he said he didn't like distinguished.
Ambrosia laughed as she watched Joey limp towards the checkout tablet. "See? I told you a tattoo on your ankle was gonna hurt, and you didn't listen. Now look at you."
Joey leaned on the counter and wrestled his wallet from the worn Wrangler jeans that fit him just right. "Yeah, but something tells me you made it hurt extra on purpose for me and Tiff beating you guys at trivia the other night."
Ambrosia rolled her eyes, but with a smile, as Mark joined Joey at the counter. Joey studied Lys as Mark pecked at the register, sizing him up and sending shivers down Lys' spine. Damn–all these years and those eyes were still magical.
Ambrosia had mercy on them both, slinging an arm around Lys as she said, "Joe, you remember Lys Lennox, right? Glace's own prodigal son?" She ruffled his hair. "Though he was a prodigal daughter when he first left."
Joey's eyebrows shot up as he blinked. "Holy shit!" He crossed the space between them and offered Lys his hand with a flustered smile on his face. "How are you?"
Lys's stomach flipped as he shook Joey's warm, calloused hand, marveling at how dazzling Joey's smile still was. "Good. Tired. Glad to be a civilian again."
"That's right–you shipped out with Ambie, didn't you?"
"Sure did."
"And what did you say your name is now?"
"Lysander. Most folks just call me Lys."
"The world was short on grown men named after haunted Victorian children," Ambrosia chimed in.
Lys shoved her off. "Like you got room to talk."
"Ambrosia is a perfectly respectful Black-ass name for a Black-ass woman, thank you very much."
Lys turned to Mark for backup, but Ambrosia's husband kept his gaze locked on the tablet screen. "Nope. I'm minding my white-ass business on that one." He turned the tablet around. "There's your total, Joe."
Joey tapped his credit card against the screen. "So, what brings you back here, Lys?"
"He's gonna be my apprentice," Ambrosia answered, gently bumping Lys with her hip. "He's had enough of working with nerds and wants to slum it with us smooth-brains."
Lys gave her an incredulous look. "They sent us to the same technical school."
"I failed said school, if memory serves me correctly."
Joey chuckled as he slipped his wallet back into his jeans. "Welp, thank you, Ambie, even though I know you took special pleasure in torturing me."
Ambrosia shrugged with a smirk. "What can I say? Someone had to knock you down a few pegs. Just because you know the names of all the Romanov siblings doesn't mean you're hot shit."
"I don't know about that." Joey's expression shifted to mock uncertainty as he teetered his hand back and forth."Our score last week says otherwise." He laughed as Ambrosia flipped him the bird, then shifted his gaze to Lys, who froze like a deer in a pair of extremely sexy headlights.
Joey looked him up and down, the man's expression suddenly calculating and maybe a little...concerned? Lys cursed himself for not going straight to his new apartment and freshening up before coming into town. Wrinkled clothes and whiffs of fast food and gas station coffee weren't exactly billboards of desirability.
But did Joey even like men, or masc-presenting people in general? Lys didn't remember any of Joey's high school girlfriends by name, but they were all pretty feminine.
Before Lys could think of something witty enough to say that would make up for his disheveled appearance, Jory shook off the expression and smiled. "Good to see you, Lys. Welcome home."
"Th...thanks," Lys said hesitantly, thrown off by the sudden shift. He watched Joey disappear out the door, waiting to be sure he was out of earshot before asking the others, "Was that weird to anyone el–"
"Actually." Joey burst back through the door, pulling his phone from his pocket as he walked straight to Lys. "Can I get your number?" He offered Lys his phone, massaging the back of his neck with an uncomfortable smile. "Sorry. This is probably weird. We never really hung out in school."
Lys blinked, his internal teenager shrieking back to life as he took the device and started typing. "No, it's cool." He could feel Ambrosia's curious gaze burning a hole in the side of his head, but Lys was just as blindsided as she was. When the hell in the last ten years did he get so interesting that Joey freaking Dubois wanted to hang out?
Joey's expression turned sheepish as he took the phone back. "Thanks." He tapped it against his opposite palm, glanced around, then meandered back towards the door. "I'll, uh...I'll be seeing you."
Ambrosia waved as he left, grinning ear to ear. "Bye! Tell Tiff and the kids we say hi!" She silently bounced on the tips of her toes for a moment, then, convinced Joey was gone for good for good, she shook Lys by the shoulders. "Ooooo, not even home a day and already getting some! Love that for you!"
Lys scoffed. "That is not what just happened. And doesn't he have a partner? And kids?"
"Oh, trust me," Ambrosia said, "Parents can be plenty into swinging and hookups. Just ask Joey's wife, Tiffany."
Lys' mouth fell open despite himself. "Shut up. She is not."
"She did," Mark chimed in, sounding tired. "We have the DMs to prove it."
Lys continued to stare at both of them, slack-jawed. "And Joey's into it? Even with men?"
Ambrosia's smile morphed into a downright Grinch-like smirk. "Very much so."
Lys paused. "...Trans men?"
Ambrosia shrugged, still looking smug. "Guess you'll have to find out and report back to us."
Lys snorted and rolled his eyes. "That's probably a no, then."
"Oh, come on." Ambrosia rolled her eyes right back at Lys. "You don't know that."
"No, but I could make a calculated guess. I'm the one who's good at math, remember?"
Ambrosia raised an eyebrow. "You're not about to get on your self-sabotaging bullshit, are you? Just let yourself have a good thing for once."
Lys didn't want to point out how easy that was for Ambrosia to say. She'd hit the lottery with Mark. They'd met during their tattoo apprenticeships shortly after Ambrosia had been discharged, deciding to get out of the Navy altogether rather than go train for a different job. He'd stuck with her through everything: coming out, medically transitioning, opening the shop, losing friends and family. Most trans people weren't that lucky, Lys among them. If he wasn't getting ghosted the second he revealed he had opted to leave his original plumbing alone, he was being pursued by chasers who were looking to satisfy a fetish. Lys internally cringed at the very thought.
Instead of diving into any of that, Lys stood in silence for a moment, then headed for the door. "You know what? I'm gonna head to the apartment. Mrs. Murphy is expecting me."
"Oh, don't be like that." Ambrosia chased after him, locking onto his arm. "At least let us help you unpack. Plus, we haven't seen Mrs. Murphy in ages."
Lys turned to Mark. When he saw the same eager expression on his face, he sighed. "Fine. Buy you," he pointed to Ambrosia, "Better be on your best behavior."
She gave an offended gasp as she brought a hand up to clutch invisible pearls. "I'm always on my best behavior. It's Mark you have to worry about."
Lys from the corner of his eye as Mark gave his wife an exasperated look.
The two locked up the store and followed Lys in their car out of Glace proper and into the dense forest of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Lys would have preferred somewhere in town for a whole list of reasons, but he couldn't turn down the price or the landlord.
He had rented the converted attic over his retired high school English teacher's garage, who had listed it on Facebook Marketplace at a discounted price in exchange for help with odd jobs around the house. Lys had snatched it up instantly–one, because of the price and, two, because what the hell was Mrs. Murphy thinking by listing rooms for rent like that? She had been over the moon to hear from Lys and hadn't asked for a single bit of evidence of income or savings before agreeing. Again, not the best call, but Lys wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.
She answered the door with a wide smile and open arms, jingling with ornate bangles and charm bracelets. Lys couldn't help but beam as she cried, "Welcome home!" and pulled him into a hug, squeezing him as tight as she could, swaying slightly side to side as her lavender perfume engulfed her former student. "Oh, I've been counting down the days! It's so good to have you back!" She released him and turned to Ambrosia and Mark with the same energy, pulling them in for hugs in turn. "It's so good to see my three favorite Reading Challengers again and getting along!"
Ambrosia laughed at that. "Mrs. Murphy, we've been getting along for, like, fifteen years."
Mrs. Murphy batted the comment away. "Oh, I know, but your rivalry was legendary!"
Lys didn't have the heart to tell her that she was probably the only person who thought that. Most students had entered the annual Reading Challengers competition for extra credit, but Lys and Ambrosia had entered primarily because, as awkward, gangly nobodies, it felt like the closest thing they might come to high school glory. So, when they first squared off freshman year, citing plot points and passages from To Kill a Mockingbird and 1984 down to the page number in the hopes the cool kids might notice them, they initially hated each other. Lys won that first year and quickly realized that, while nobody outside the English department cared about Reading Challengers, they actually sort of enjoyed being around one another. That didn't stop the two of them from squaring off in the composition for the rest of their high school careers, though.
Mrs. Murphy pulled the door shut behind her and motioned for the three to follow her. "I'll give you a tour of the house another day. I've had trouble keeping up with it since Leonard passed. Let me show you your new place."
"I could help, if you like," Lys offered.
"Nonsense." Mrs. Murphy waved away the offer. "It was hard enough to ask for help with the yard. These sorts of things call for baby steps." She led them down a long gravel driveway that led to a garage styled to look like an old red barn, complete with a weather vane on top. Rickety wood stairs scaled the side, leading to a door split in two, the bottom painted red and the top framing four panels of glass.
"There's a hook on the inside that keeps the two halves together," Mrs. Murphy explained as she fiddled with the doorknob. "It lets a nice breeze in off the lake in the summer." Finally, the door gave and creaked open, as if annoyed that the group had disturbed its slumber. "I did the best I could to clean it up, but it's old. Outdated. It was here when we bought the place, but Leonard and I never bothered with renting it out. The kids kept us too busy."
Lys fell in love with the place immediately. The kitchen counters were chipped, the finishing on the cabinets was worn, and the appliances didn't look like they'd been updated since George W. Bush was president (hell, maybe even Bush Sr.), but something about the wornness echoed back Lys' own exhaustion, like it knew how to hold space for his soul.
He beamed as he turned to Mrs. Murphy and said, "It's perfect."
Mrs. Murphy's shoulders relaxed as she exhaled. "I'm so glad. I worried you'd turn tail and run at the sight of it."
Lys stripped off his jacket and set it on the kitchen counter. "After sleeping in a metal coffin surrounded by, like, fifty dudes in their own metal coffins, this is practically a suite at the Hilton."
Mrs. Murphy shook her head. "I don't know how you did it–going out so far with no one to call if things went wrong. You're much braver than I am."
"Oh, I wasn't brave," Lys corrected. "I was young, stupid, and desperate."
Ambrosia snorted and folded her arms. "I hear that," she muttered under her breath.
"Even so," Mrs. Murphy said as she dropped a pair of keys into Lys's hands. "You're both so strong to do what you did." She dropped a pair of keys into Lys's hands. "I'll let you get settled in." She meandered to the front door. "Let's have dinner sometime this week–you look like you're about to blow away in the wind."
Lys smiled. "Yeah, swing shift didn't exactly do great things for my diet."
"Well, my recipe cards are itching to get out of their Rolodex, so I'm sure we can do something about that." Mrs. Murphy began down the stairs, landing, and pointed across the yard. "That's where I keep all the yard equipment." Lys looked for a large wooden shed on the edge of the property, its padlock glinting in the late-afternoon sun. "That's the other key I gave you. I don't have any rules for you other than to keep everything neat when you use it."
Lys nodded. "Yes, ma'am."
"There's my other rule right there." Mrs. Murphy began down the stairs again. "Don't call me ma'am. Oh, and Lysander?"
Lys paused, looked down at Mrs. Murphy with a quizzical look.
She gave him a warm, grandmotherly grin as she said, "I really am glad to have you home," and then hobbled down the rest of the stairs and towards the house.
The words squeezed like a fist around Lys' heart. Glace had stopped feeling like home long before he had left, but something about how Mrs. Murphy had said that, how this day had already been so good, made Lys believe it could be different this time. It could be good.
Even with all the blood this place had under its fingernails.
A heavy hand on his shoulder snapped Lys out of his thoughts. He turned to find Ambrosia grinning at him, smile broad and eyes glinting. "Well, bachelor," she said. "Ready to move into your pad?"
Lys didn't own much. He'd worked so much that properly furnishing an apartment felt like a waste of time, so three sets of hands made unloading the truck a breeze. Lys made the last trek, pausing at the sight of the worn office storage box and his gun safe at the far end of the truck bed.
The box was such a bland thing–a scuffed-up, unlabeled white frame and a simple, unassuming brown lid, yet it made the truck bed feel like a mile long and made Lys brace himself, like it would be twice the weight of the gun safe it sat on. Instead, Lys lifted them with ease and carried them into the apartment without the slightest strain.
He stood in his doorway and surveyed the space, more disappointed by its emptiness than he had expected. "It's giving less 'bachelor pad' and more 'divorced dad with weekend visitation,'" he said.
Mark gave him a sympathetic smile. "It's just got room to grow, is all."
Ambrosia eyed the box and the safe in Lys's hands. "What's that?" She gave it a good-natured flick with her nails. "You moonlighting as a private investigator or something?"
Lys took his time finding a place for the box and the safe on the kitchen counter, struggling and failing to find a soft explanation. "It's my family's case file, actually."
Heaviness fell over the room with the force of an anvil. Mark's face scrunched into confused concern while Ambrosia deflated with a sigh as she brought her hands to her hips.
"You really need to warn me before I put my foot in my mouth like that."
Lys forced a laugh as he leaned on top of the box. "It's okay. You didn't know. It's probably crazy to keep holding onto it after these years."
Ambrosia shook her head. "It isn't," Ambrosia nearly spat. "I'd be hanging on, too, if everyone just gave up on my family like that. Everyone involved did Anna and your dad dirty as hell, the bastards."
Lys shrugged, because what else was he supposed to do? What was anyone supposed to do when a man turned up dead with no fathomable explanation, and a little girl disappeared into the woods without a trace? If the Navy had taught him anything, it was that shit happened, it rolled downhill, and sometimes you just had to find a way to roll with it, for better or worse.
Ambrosia's phone chimed, easing the tension a bit as she dug it out of her pocket and read the screen. "On that lovely note, we need to head back and get set up for our afternoon appointments." She gave Lys a pained look. "I really am sorry, Lys."
"It's okay," he insisted. "Really. You didn't know."
"Okay..." Ambrosia studied him a moment longer, then crossed the space to hug him. "Just...call us if you start looking for answers again, okay?" She squeezed tight. "I don't want to get you back just to lose you to rabbit holes that could collapse with you in them."
Lys squeezed her back, savoring the smell of incense that clung to her clothes. Mark gave Lys a brotherly pat on the shoulder, then Lys walked them out to the platform, lingering on the steps and waving as they drove away before returning to the apartment and eying the Japanese-style futon he'd laid out in the far corner. He knew he should finish unpacking, at least a little bit, but the quiet solitude lulled Lys' exhaustion from the box he had tucked it in, whispering that he had the willpower to only lie down for thirty minutes–ten to check his phone, maybe scroll through a few random videos on social media, then 20 for a short nap.
But one minute he was watching a mini docuseries on the history of wheat cultivation, then the next he was opening his eyes to find the apartment dusky and dim. Lys blinked in the twilight and stretched out long as he reoriented himself and wondered what he should unpack first. Or if he should unpack at all. It wasn't as if he had anywhere to be until Monday or anyone to answer to.
Just as Lys was drifting off again into the bliss of not having any responsibilities for the time being, his phone pinged. He groped around for it, then squinted to read a new message from an unknown number through the blinding blue light.
Unknown: Hey. It's Joey. Are you down to get that drink?
Lys scrambled to sit up and read the message again. Joey Dubois wanted to hang out now? Maybe Ambrosia was onto something after all. Lys typed back, because Joey already knew damn well Lys didn't have anything going on. Why feign being busy?
Sure. Did you have somewhere in mind?
Joey fired back a link for a local dive bar, making Lys' eyebrows arch.
Unknown: Is 30 minutes okay?
Lys blinked down at his screen, trying to decide if he needed a minute to process. Holy shit–was Ambrosia right? Was Joey looking to hook up? Why else was he trying to meet up so soon and so fast? Lys couldn't think of any other explanation, but he wasn't sure if that was because he was still exhausted from driving or because he hadn't gotten properly laid in months. Maybe it was both.
Lys shook his head and decided it didn't matter. If this turned into a hookup, cool. If not, also cool. He couldn't plan on only hanging out with Ambrosia and Mark for the rest of his life.
Yeah. See you then.
Lys quickly scrubbed down in the shower and changed into the least wrinkled clothes in his suitcase before dashing out the door, taking a minute to fix his hair in the rearview mirror of his truck before heading out. He'd let it grow out the last few weeks–because what was his chain of command going to do about it? Write him up on his way out of the service?–but it still looked more military than he would have liked. Oh, well. Joey hadn't seemed to mind. Maybe his wife wouldn't either.
The dive bar sat on the opposite edge of town, just on the outside of the city limits, surrounded by imposing woods dyed black by the coming night. Its sign spun slowly, making it a lighthouse for Glace's bored locals, folks passing through, and the occasional teenager who had managed to get their hands on a fake ID (not that Lys would know anything about that).
The clack of pool balls kept time for the dad rock playing over the stereo as Lys walked in and scanned the bar for Joey. The place hadn't changed at all. Then again, it hadn't seemed to have changed from the late 80s back when Lys had occasionally–or rather, definitely–come here. Neon signs advertised big-name beers against aged wood paneling. Faded, wrinkled posters advertised 99-cent cheese curds. Sprinkled in were photos documenting Glace's history, starting with its inception as a logging town, all the way up to last year when the owner's twin girls' little league team won the regional championship.
Joey spotted Lys first, waving him down from one of the dive's few booths. Lys joined him, sliding across the cracked pleather of the opposite bench.
"Hope this is okay," Joey said. "There are better places in town, but were gonna be crowded. I wanted space so we could talk."
"This is fine. They've got solid food." Lys smirked, raising an eyebrow. "What did you want to talk about?"
Joey studied Lys, wringing his hands as his mouth scrunched. He took a deep breath to speak, but only got a single syllable out before a waitress came over and asked for their orders. Joey ordered a classic cheeseburger while Lys ordered the dive's blue cheese bacon special and a Coke.
"You sober?" Joey asked as the waitress walked away.
"Alcohol wise, yeah. About five years," Lys answered. He dropped his gaze and traced the lines in the wood laminate of the table. "Quit after my mom's accident."
"Oh." Joey began wringing his hands again. "Yeah...I remember that happening. I'm sorry, Lys."
Lys looked at Joey through his lashes, trying to steer the conversation to lighter, more present topics. "I'm down to trying all sorts of fun stuff now that I'm a civilian, though."
Joey gave an awkward chuckle and massaged the back of his neck. "Yeah. It's nice having other options." He paused as the waitress dropped off his beer and Lys's pop, taking a big swig, then letting out a long, suffering sigh. "Okay, I don't know how I'm supposed to say this, so I'll just get it out there."
Lys schooled his face into careful neutrality so he could feign shock and flattery.
Joey met Lys' gaze, his brow knitted in confusion and worry. "I think I saw your sister in the woods, Lys," he said. "I think she's still alive."
