“No,” I say. My voice is perky as though I can’t wait to find out.

Alice takes my hand and pulls me until I am looking at her with all of my attention.

“Well,” she begins, and anxiety fills me head to toe.

But she continues. “Someone was following him too close. You’re not supposed to do that. You’re supposed to stay far away from the car in front of you. Then he slammed on his brakes, and the car behind him crashed right into the back of him! And it was one of those really little cars so it got all dented. And then the driver of that stupid little car said she was going to call the police, but then he told her that when you hit someone from behind, it’s always your fault. Always.”

My heart pounds as she rambles on. I try to be patient. I don’t want to agitate her. But I am finding it difficult.

Alice keeps rambling.

“And then she gave him a lot of money so he wouldn’t go to the police or the insurance people—and you know what else?” She giggles then. “He gets to keep all the money when that happens.”

I open my mouth, am about to ask her what she means by this and how she knows. Is he filled with rage? Is he proud of making people crash their cars?

But I don’t ask. I don’t care. I need to get outside to that fence and see where it leads, see where we are in relation to the town. The sky is clear. The air is warm enough to go out in these clothes. At least while it’s daylight.

I don’t know if I can trust this instinct, but it is strong. And it tells me to leave this house.

“Come on!” Alice says. “Do you want to see where I was born?”

Alice takes me back down the hall, past the bedroom on the left where I slept. Past another bedroom on the left, then a bathroom on the right and a third bedroom after that. This is a strange house—I have not seen any stairs. It’s laid out like a long ranch, but has the facade of a farm house, with the porch and the gable roof.

Next to the last bedroom is a smaller room. It’s dark and windowless and has a sink and hookup for a washer. The floor is not wood like the other rooms and the hallway. It has hard ceramic tile. There is some kind of toilet in the corner.

“Here!” she says. “Right here! My mother didn’t like hospitals.”