They left Burton lying on the asphalt next to the Jetta, clutching at papers picked up by a softly stirring breeze. Somewhere towards the back of his mind Chet felt a twinge of guilt, and a dark realization that Burton might be able to recognize him. But with the Handbook in his possession, he didn't care. He realized now where he'd heard of Joanie McKittrick: she was Kenya's roommate, mentioned in passing between makeout sessions. Another volleyball player. There was bad blood there, some kind of falling out. He'd assumed Joanie was the reason Kenya had never invited him back to her room, much as Dick was the reason he hadn't invited her to his.

Alex hit the steering wheel hard with the heel of his hand. "The fuck, dude. You're out of your fucking mind. Beating the shit out of a professor. What if he calls the cops? You think about that?"

"Calm down, rock star. He's not calling any cops." Roger reached down, under the Taurus's dashboard. His middle finger came back with a smear of red. "He doesn't want any cops asking too many questions about the teenage girl that was definitely staying at his apartment." Roger wiped his hand on his jeans and looked over his shoulder at Chet. "Isn't that right, chief?"

"What?"

Roger nodded at the Handbook-shaped bulge in Chet's pocket. "That's hers, isn't it? Joanie McKittrick?"

Alex pounded the steering wheel again. "Are you fucking kidding me? We came here looking for Joanie?"

"You know her?" Roger pulled a battered pack of Camels out of his pocket, drew one out with his teeth, and lit it.

"Don't smoke in my car."

Roger cracked the window half an inch, made a show of exhaling toward it.

"Christ, you're such an asshole," said Alex. "Yes, I know Joanie. My girl—my bass player was like her best friend in high school. Why the hell would Avery need to find her?"

"Do I gotta paint a picture for you? She's a Creature. They take one of ours, we take one of theirs."

"What 'ours,' dude? You're not even part of this. Are you some kind of Dead Men groupie or what?"

Roger flicked some ash in the general direction of the ashtray, missing it by inches. "Someday," he said. "Someday you children are going to learn that the goddamn universe doesn't revolve around you. Not while you're at the University. No. Not while you're here. But someday. Time makes the world smaller. Someday you'll wake up and realize that your universe has shrunk, and there's no room in it for anything but you."

Something throbbed on Chet's hip. He was sure it was his Handbook. He wanted to tear it open, find out what it had to say about Roger. Find out if he was right.

"Joanie's Handbook," said Roger. "Look up the professor. Find out where she is."

Chet ignored whatever message his own Handbook was trying to send him. He pulled Joanie's out of his pocket and consulted the index for a Dr. Burton.

"I was staying at Dr. Burton's and I...I had to get away." You don't know why you're telling this girl so much, this girl you just met, in a place that is your dorm but isn't. You feel like you've stepped inside someone else's memory. Everything is bright and soft around the edges, warm and soft and bright. The girl – Molly, she says – radiates something. "He was always so nice to me. He...he said I could get into Iowa." It hits you, finally. "Fuck. He was just saying that, wasn't he?"

"Maybe," says Molly. "They'll say anything. Every once in a while it's the truth."

"And he let me stay there after Kenya..."Just thinking about Kenya makes your legs go wobbly. You reach out for something to steady yourself and your hand finds the desk Molly was sitting at. You collapse into her chair. She touches your shoulder, and all you feel is warmth, like a sunbeam hitting your skin. You want to unfold yourself in it, luxuriate in it like a cat next to a window. You felt that way about Kenya once, and Audrey before that. In their presence you were warm and safe. But then they took that warmth and safety away; clouds moved to block the sun, and you were left alone, on the wrong side of cold glass.

"My friends all left me," you say, but here in this room you're not sure if it's true.

"Maybe," Molly says. "Maybe not. I never had many friends. Any friends, really." She picks up the notebook off the desk, but doesn't open it. She hugs it to her chest. "I thought that made me special. I didn't need friends. I had more important things to do. I thought if I was going to be alone, I should make a place where I had no choice but to be alone. A place where I could hide and no one could find me. The problem with that is that eventually people stop looking." She opens her notebook and leafs through the pages. You catch a glimpse of a drawing of a building. It looks like Mary Rutherford. Your home. "I used to fantasize about living in a haunted house. I never thought I'd be the ghost."

"Keep looking," said Roger. "Fucking Handbook, always talking in fucking riddles."

"Dude." Alex drummed on the steering wheel. "There's..." He tapped on the wheel a half dozen times, searching for something. "Molly. That's her name, right?"

"Whose name?"

"The architect. The crazy one. Molly Rankerson. Right?"

"Fuck do I know about any architect?"

"You never took the campus tour? Never read the brochure?"

Roger just took another drag of his cigarette.

"Chet, back me up here."

"I don't know, man. That sounds vaguely familiar. That's who designed Sluke, right?"

"Yeah, and the art school."

"This is some teenage girl, though. Rankerson's gotta be like sixty by now."

"I don't know, dude. Tell me some weird shit hasn't been going on. Have you two dummies never heard of the Pi Floor?"

"The what?"

"Look it up. I guarantee it's in there."

Chet flipped through the index. "There's no 'Pi Floor' in here."

"Yeah, of course. They wouldn't make it that easy. See if there's, like, 'Hiding Places' or something."

Chet found it under "Your Secret Place." There was a lot of stuff about an elevator to the roof of Thorn Hall, and a long tangent about the life of Anthony Delmonico. Then there was this:

No secret can remain hidden forever. A secret is a virus, and it can only be contained by sealing yourself off from everyone else. Any contact, no matter how brief, is a chance for the secret to spread; and once your secret spreads, the roof will no longer be your sanctuary. You will need to find a new secret place.

The UNWG campus, the Family Delmonico in particular, affords the reclusive student a number of secluded cubbies and nooks in which to secret him or herself for reasons of security or simply to enjoy some well-earned solitude. You may wish to begin your search with one of these options:

MARY RUTHERFORD HALL:

1. The Van Zandt Stairway – A false wall in the north wing of the 2nd floor provides access to a hidden stair, which in turn leads to a little-used closet in the basement of Miss R. "Little-used" does not mean "never used," however, particularly if the custodian needs the wet/dry vac (which she frequently does after home football games).

2. Room 126, aka The South's Lunch Shall Rise Again Room – The historically-preserved bedroom where Robert E. Lee once recovered from a spell of botulism is officially off-limits to students, which makes it a particularly good place to hide, if you are not averse to a little risk. Dim, period-appropriate lighting, bulky furniture and privacy curtains (which kept prying eyes from alighting on the ailing General) only add to the eremitic appeal. (American History majors may note that Lee never ventured south of the Commonwealth once he took charge of the Army of Northern Virginia, but where's the fun in "history?")

3. The Pi Floor – Probably does not actually exist, but if you're desperate, you're welcome to try; maybe you'll get lucky. According to famed architect Molly Rankerson, one may reach the Pi Floor by entering the third-floor bathroom by the north door and exiting from the south door. Good luck.

HAYES HALL

Oy, where to begin? This eyesore is nothing but hiding places and secret corridors. Really, just wait till one of the halls clears out and start yanking on light fixtures; you're bound to stumble into something suitable.

WINTERTREE HALL

1. The Auditorium – The network of dressing and storage rooms above and behind the stage are perfect places to "run lines" with a paramour or experiment with makeup and tights. For more privacy, try the catwalk (not recommended for vertigo sufferers).

2. The Sub-Laundry Room – The room under the main laundry room is kept empty due to the noise and tremors produced by the machines. If you can find your way into this room, you'll be rewarded with such an ideal hermitage you may never wish to leave. (Hint: try doing your delicates in the farthest machine from the door on the north wall.)

3. The New Party Room, aka Heaven Mark II – That's right, 79A is not the only previously-inaccessible room in the dorm. If you don't already know where this is, you're obviously not one of the cool kids.

SLUKE HALL

1. The Cupola – If the Mary Rutherford cupola only brings up painful memories, try the functionally identical one perched atop Sluke, protected only by an easily picked lock. In addition to seclusion, provides a spectacular view of campus.

2. The Forbidden Balcony – Accessible only from a window in Room 319. The residents' friendship can be bought with Goldschläger. Did you know that the gold flakes in Goldschläger can cut tiny holes in your esophagus? Of course you didn't, because it's not true. But tell the Ukrainian girls in 319 that and watch them freak out. (Further research is needed to determine whether Jägermeister contains deer blood. Ask a new friend.)

3. The Sluke Pi Floor – Unlike its Mary Rutherford counterpart, this one is empirically real. Same rules apply, just switch east and west for north and south. But be careful. The Floor is a bit like Mt. Everest, in that a fair percentage of those who visit never come back.

Interestingly, Sluke does not have a Van Zandt Stairway, as Molly Rankerson was unaware of its presence in Mary Rutherford. Instead, she just put a pillar of solid concrete where the stairway should be. But it's possible that some enterprising Diplomatic Training students might have hollowed out that pillar and created a new place to hide in there, and may have also used it to cache an impressive and profitable collection of contraband.

Chet didn't know what to make of this "Pi Floor" business. He felt like he was looking through a screen; he could see the edges of a shape, but not what it contained. "This says there are two Pi Floors."

"There you go, dude. There's the one that Molly Rankerson imagined, and the one she actually built."

Roger scoffed. "This is bullshit. Give me the book."

Chet didn't want to let go of the Handbook just yet. "I mean, I don't see how any of this can turn an old woman back into a teenager."

"I don't know, dude." Alex shrugged. "But riddle me this, Boy Wonder: what if the Pi Floor she built is also the one she imagined?"

Roger reached over the seat. "Okay, this is definitely bullshit. Hand it over."

The Handbook felt heavy in Chet's hands. He could swear it didn't want him to give it to Roger.

Alex pulled the Taurus onto Osborne, the southern border of the original campus. Just over Roger's shoulder, Chet could see the blazing crown of the Tower, jutting above the trees southeast of the borderline. Wintertree wasn't visible from here, but he could feel its gravity, the dark locked box at the center of campus.

"Give me the book, dipshit." Roger reached for Joanie's Handbook. His fingernails were filthy, rimmed with unwashable grime, the claws of an animal too long in the wild. There was hunger in his eyes, written in the predatory lines and angles of his face.

The Taurus jerked to a stop at the light at Milligan. "No," said Chet. He opened the door and ran.