Rowan shook his head when he saw me. “Shit, Maisy. Why’d you go trailing me?” I looked down at my shoes. They were wet and had moss stuck to them. Then he said to the troll, “Sure, Carl. That’s my sister. I’d trust her with my life.” That made me feel better. But the troll still looked like he did bad things.

Rowan stomped over and grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the bushes. “Did Gloria send you after me?” He was angry.

“No,” I whispered. There was no sun under the bridge and it smelled bad.

“Then why are you on my heels?”

“I thought, I thought.” My throat started to hurt. “Last summer Gloria said you weren’t allowed to leave me out. She said that a bunch of times. And now you’re leaving me out every day.”

“I just want some time on my own. And that was a whole year ago.”

“Still,” I said. What difference did that make?

Then he said I could never ever tell Gloria about the troll. “Absolutely no way.” I had to promise. He made me swear on Telly’s grave. “But Telly’s not dead,” I said, and Rowan told me to just pretend he was. So I swore on Telly’s grave. Future grave, same as Mrs. Spooner.

“Never mind, Magic Boy,” the troll said. “Why don’t you two take a seat on these fine chairs?” He waved his hand next to the fire.

I tugged Rowan’s T-shirt. There were no fine chairs. No chairs at all.

The wiener was bubbled up, and the man tugged it off with his huge fingers and cracked it in two. Steam came out. He offered half to me. I tugged harder on Rowan’s T-shirt.

“We’re good, Carl,” he said.

“We’re good, Carl,” the troll said back. Then he gave it to the brown dog.

The dog swallowed it in one gulp.

“We should go,” I whispered to Rowan. “We shouldn’t be here.”

The troll turned his head to the side, whispered, “No, no. Not everyone. You can’t believe that.” Then he laughed, but it was a scary laugh. “It’s concentric reasoning.”

I opened my mouth, but air just sat in front of my face.

“Relax, Turtle,” Rowan said. “So he rambles a bit. Not like it’s hurting anyone. Carl’s my friend.”

“Carl’s my friend,” the troll repeated. He had his head down and his face inside the front of his coat. “Carl’s my friend, Turtle. Carl’s my friend.” The dog barked and scritched the troll’s leg.

“For sure,” Rowan said, a bit louder this time. “We’re friends, Carl.”

Rowan liked saying that. I could just tell.

Then the troll lifted his giant head and looked at us. “Who’s Carl? Nobody knows Carl.”

I yanked even harder on Rowan’s T-shirt.

“I thought—” he said.