“We protect the past. And the way I see it, that means we need to understand it.”

“If Mom was feeling ambitious, she scribbled a small list of items beneath the word, but seeing as her handwriting is virtually illegible, we won’t know what’s in each box until we actually open it. Like Christmas. Except we already own everything.”

“My heart sinks. I guess I should be glad he doesn’t care, but I’m not. He’s supposed to care. Mom cares so much, it’s smothering; but that doesn’t mean he’s allowed to do this, to check out. And suddenly I need him to care. I need him to give me something so I know he’s still here, still Dad.”

“It’s not that Mom didn’t keep anything, it’s that she kept the wrong things. We leave memories on objects we love and cherish, things we use and wear down.”

“We make a good team, Mackenzie Bishop.” “We do.” We do, and that is the thing that tempers the heat beneath my skin, checks the flutter of girlish nerves. This is Wesley. My friend. My partner. Maybe one day my Crew. The fear of losing that keeps me in check.”

“I want to be oblivious to the hurt written on her face. I want to be selfish and young and normal. M would be that way. She would need space to grieve. She would rebel because her parents were simply uncool, not because one was wearing a horrifying happy mask and the other was a living ghost. She’d be distant because she was preoccupied with boys or school, not because she’s tired from hunting down the Histories of the dead, or distracted by her new hotel-turned-apartment, where the walls are filled with crimes.”

“You, Mackenzie Bishop,” he says as we hit the landing, “have been a very bad girl.” “How so?” He rounds the banister at the base of the staircase. “You involved me in a lie! Don’t think I didn’t catch it.”