THE HOUSE IN THE MOUNTAINS, by Michael WashburnWho can say where the call and response, the symmetries, the events mirroring each other in odd ways, really begin? If they do not originate here, on a gray day in Oakland, California, in the late summer of 1995, then at least the events of this day form part of the pattern. Two boys, Jason Cole and Len Dupas, fifteen and sixteen, wait by a curb for a bus. The drizzle is beginning to build. After spending the afternoon in the comic shops, fast-food joints, and game halls of Berkeley, Jason and Len are headed for the bungalow of the older boy’s divorced mom. When the bus finally comes, they are pretty wet. It rolls up beside them and the doors swish open, but before they can enter, a woman in her late thirties, 5’6” and two hundred and thirty p
