“They’re my neighbors,” said Jack next to me.

No one asked him if it was true or whether he’d heard anything, as if we didn’t want the story contradicted because it made us feel better, that the spirits of the woods could be spoken to and could be merciful if we just asked.

“What kind of Indians were here? Was it like Sioux or Cherokee?” Tony asked.

“Delaware,” said Jack.

“No,” Wilson said, cutting in. “That’s what white settlers called them because they couldn’t say their name. They were Lenape.” I had never heard of them.

“What happened to them?” asked Tony.

“They got wiped out. They got disease, and most of them were pushed west.” Wilson had finally sat down at the fire, next to Abbey.

We were silent for a moment, and then Wilson spoke again.

“They have a cool creation story, though. Their creator had a dream of earth, and he created a special tree. From the roots of that tree the first man was born. Then the man born from the tree kissed the earth, and that’s how woman was made. So the whole of human creation came from the roots of trees.”

I doubt anyone sitting at the fire had ever heard Wilson McVay say so much.

“Who’d have taken you for all this hippie talk?” said Sage. “Where’d you hear all this?”

“He’s making it up for the tree girl,” said Abbey, looking over at me. What the fuck was wrong with Abbey, and why did she keep saying these things to me about Wilson? And especially in front of Jack, who might also say some of this back to Thomas.

Wilson stared back at her. “I didn’t make it up. My mom’s an anthropologist. She’s always talking about this stuff.” I remembered the bag of drugs he’d brought down to our house, saying his mother’s medicine cabinet was so full she wouldn’t miss any of it.

Nobody said anything, and they were all probably thinking what I was: how strange to imagine Wilson McVay with a mother, never mind sitting down with her, listening to her tell creation stories.

“So why are all you pioneers sitting around with spears?” Wilson asked. “You plan to fight the police with your sharpened sticks?”

“Oh wait, I forgot!” Tony said. He leapt up and ran back over toward the woodpile.

“Maybe he killed a squirrel with his BB gun that he wants us to cook,” said Sage.

“Or snake,” said Abbey.

“Copperhead or garter?” Sage and Abbey cracked up.