“I’m so stupid.” I tried to say this, to explain to Carl, but it sounded all jangled. My mouth was swollen. When I tapped it with my thumb, the skin felt like it might burst.

“What’s that?”

“Stupid,” I tried a second time.

“Stupid,” he said back. He shone a flashlight in my face and I lifted my hand to block it. When he clicked off the light he said, “I got it, I do. I got it, Dot.” Carl picked up the blanket he’d been using, and came toward me. “Sure, now. Urh. Don’t be like that.” He shook his head forcefully. “You’re wrong, Stan. Without proof there’s only doubt. First year, first day. The brightest room in the whole solar system.”

Sometimes Carl made no sense at all, but it didn’t matter. I don’t know why I was so scared when I got there. He was the exact same as he’d been all summer. Peculiar, but welcoming. He put the blanket over my shoulders and it was still warm, and even though my face throbbed, my chest filled with relief. I was with a person who knew me and cared about me and would never, ever leave me outside in lightning.

He nudged me toward the fire. I sat down, wrapped the blanket over my knees. A long time passed before I stopped shaking. The smoke smelled good.

“I thought you were Workers,” Carl said. His fingers combed through his hair, worked the twists of metal. Fixing them tighter. “Workers coming to find me. They rang my doorbell once. Stood right on the, the, urh, steps of my house.”

I shook my head. There was a low drone inside my skull.

“Hard to tell sometimes. Workers only come in twos, though. Dressed better than you, and I never saw them cry before. They tried to tell me a message out of a book. A message about, urh, a powerful being. Wires, urh, hidden under their coats.”

I wished Carl wouldn’t talk about people who worked. Everyone worked. There was nothing wrong with that. My stomach started quivering like I was scared. But I couldn’t be scared. I was with Carl. I knew Carl. I’d known him for weeks. He was a good person.

I heard plastic crinkling then. “You hungry?” he asked.

“My tooth.” I pointed at my mouth and started crying again.

“My tooth,” he said.

Flashlight in my face again, and he reached out and pulled down my lip.

“An avulsion injury. You got it, Magic Boy? Teeth decay. Teeth depart. It’s the government. They start with a seed and then they cultivate and pull…”

I couldn’t make out the last bit, but I nodded.

“Give it to me.”