he said.
“Explain,” Finn commanded.
“This is just a spreadsheet for calculating how much money you need for a project. The research office provides this template”—he pointed at the second spreadsheet—“and you fill in the numbers. See, this is what Emily estimated for her airfare; this is for graduate student assistance; this is for computer equipment.”
“What’s F and A?” I asked.
“Facilities and Administration. When you get a grant from some outside agency, like the federal government or a nonprofit organization, you ask for the money you, the researcher, will need. Then the school tacks on a percentage to cover the school’s costs. They have to hold the money, distribute the checks, audit the researcher’s books. That’s the ‘administration’ part. The ‘facilities’ part is to cover overhead for things like electricity and computer maintenance and stuff like that.”
“So why are the two numbers different?” Finn asked.
Reggie shrugged. “This one, the one with the higher number, that’s the official spreadsheet the university generates. This other one, that looks like Emily created it herself.”
“Oh, right!” I said. “Finn, remember when Alice brought Emily the grant documents? She said she couldn’t get to the budget spreadsheet because it was on the university drive, so Emily said she was going to have to re-create it from the printout.”
Reggie nodded. “Yeah, this first one you showed me, EmilyGrant, is probably the one that Emily created herself. She just used a different percentage, 48.5 instead of 49, for this calculation.”
He picked up a blue folder that was on top of the desk clutter, the words “Summer Grant” scrawled across its front in black marker. He flipped open the folder and pulled out a printed spreadsheet.
“See, if she was re-creating this spreadsheet, it looks here like the F and A percentage is 48.5. But apparently in the official spreadsheet, the number is rounded up to 49 before the F and A is calculated.”
It looked to me like Emily was in the right and whoever had drafted the official spreadsheet had made the error. I had kept the books for Wayne’s Weed and Seed before Wayne Jones and I got divorced, so I knew how easy it was to make an error in a big ol’ spreadsheet. I guessed that professional number crunchers could make mistakes just like us little guys.
Reggie spun around in Emily’s chair to face us. “Like I said, it’s just a math error. No big deal. Now can I get back to work?”
“Sure,” Finn said.
Reggie didn’t budge.
“You have to leave,” he said, waving us toward the door.
Finn and I did as we were told, though Finn pocketed the key to Emily’s office. Thankfully, Reggie didn’t think to ask for it back.
We trudged out to the parking lot, dejected.
“That got us exactly nowhere,” Finn complained.
“Not exactly,” I said. “At least now we know that she was working on her grant the night she died. She was making plans for the future. Which means she thought she had a future to plan for.”
Finn stopped in his tracks and lowered his head.
“She didn’t plan to die,” he said softly.
“No. She planned to live.”
He pulled me close, wrapped me in his arms. “Thank you,” he whispered into my hair.
I just hugged him closer.
chapter 23
Emily’s parents claimed their daughter and returned to Minnesota. Finn asked if they wanted to stay with him, to linger long enough for a memorial service, but they declined. They were eager to whisk their child away from the place that took her life, and I couldn’t blame them.
Ultimately, it became clear that Emily Clowper had no ties to Dalliance beyond the Dickerson campus, and the faculty, staff, and students of the university were ready to put the whole sordid situation behind them. No one wanted to dwell on Emily Clowper’s death, and that meant no one particularly wanted to remember her life.
Instead of a memorial service, which would have been all the sadder for the lack of attendants, we decided to honor Emily by helping her parents pack up her earthly possessions.
That Thursday morning, ominous clouds roiled on the horizon, boding a powerful early-summer storm. By the time Alice and I got out of class and piled into the van, fat raindrops hit the windshield with an almost purposeful smack, not just falling but diving to earth. We drove slowly through the veils of water to Emily’s house.
Finn and Bree were already parked in her driveway. I could just barely make out their shadows in the front seat of Finn’s Jeep. When my headlights sliced the gloom,