East wondered who had written this brochure—and why she thought it was his.

“Is it true?” continued the woman. “That they’ll just let you? Camp out?” The woman stuffed the brochure back in her pocket and retrieved her gloves and put them back on. “I’m a hiker,” she clarified. “Is it true? That they’ll just let you stay in their yards if you need to?”

Before East could answer, the woman was providing information that was more cryptic than illuminating.

“’Cause I need to. Camp out. ’Cause I’m where I need to be. And I came a long way to be here—I’m from a part of the country that’s a little closer to things. I’ve never been this far north before. Or east.” The woman took in the sky and the wide-open, empty space of the northeasternmost corner of the United States. She felt like she was in a forgotten place. Unthought of, even. Which is one step below forgotten, because forgotten places were once at least thought of.

“Anyway,” she continued, still marveling at the wide-open space, “it feels like the end of the world. And here I am at the end of the world, and I have nowhere to go, unless it’s not true, I mean, is it true?” asked the woman, turning to East. “Would you let a hiker who was where she needed to be camp out in your yard for free? I mean, if a person really needed to?”

“Well—”

“Really, really needed to?”

The woman fell silent and waited for East’s answer. Which wasn’t forthcoming, because East was a little overwhelmed by all of the woman’s questions. There were so many of them. And they seemed more like demands than questions. Which, East had come to learn, was how people from away often asked their questions.

But East didn’t seem to mind all of the woman’s questions/demands. Because he just wanted to help her out in any way he could. “Well,” he began, “if a person really needed to stay here and camp out … well, I wouldn’t want to get in the way of that, but—”

“Oh!” cried the woman, interrupting him and rushing him. “Thank you!” she exclaimed. And the next thing East knew, she was hugging him, and her face was embedded in his torso.

He smelled like woodsmoke and gasoline, and the woman felt like she wanted to smell that smell for the rest of her life.

And she felt a strange lightness start to fill up her insides. It made her feel like she had the glow of the Milky Way inside her. And like gravity might lose its hold on her.

East was also feeling that strange lightness—again. This time, it made him feel like part of him was levitating—as if his one self had become two, and his levitating self was looking down at the earthbound one that was being embraced by the woman. But then the woman suddenly pulled away from him, and East felt his floating self crash back down into his earthbound one. And he felt like a magical spell had been broken.