I walked back and sat on the deck. I sat in the same spot where Rowan was. Water from the storm went through my shorts, but I didn’t care. Chicken finished his business and came and plopped down next to me. He didn’t care about the water neither. He was warm, and I pushed in close. Me and Chicken watched the woods together. We waited and waited. I picked all the tiny bits of wet grass off my feet. I pulled some burrs out of Chicken’s fur. Then I put my face near his ear. “Rowan’s not with Carl. Right, Chicken? He’s going to come out of the woods any second.” Chicken yawned and closed his eyes.

“What’s wrong with you?”

I jumped. Gloria was yelling out from the kitchen.

“Talking to a dog? Get up from there and come inside.”

I went into the kitchen. Gloria’s hair was puffed and there was still black under her eyes.

“Go wake up your brother. I want him scraping down the porch. All that flaking paint gone.”

“He’s not home, Gloria.”

“What? Up and out already?”

I shook my head.

“That kid spends more time at the library than the bloody librarians.”

I shook my head again.

“Well, he better not be up at that old bat’s house.”

“Mrs. Spooner?”

“You got that right.”

“He went into the woods. I saw him last night. I slept with Chicken and the door was locked and he never came back.” I closed my mouth then. I couldn’t tell about Carl, because I swore on Telly’s future grave.

“What?”

I nodded.

“Well, that can’t be right. He’s got himself poked away somewhere. He’s not that senseless.”

I followed Gloria upstairs and she opened Rowan’s bedroom and looked at his messy bed and all the books spilled on the floor. “Pigsty,” she said. Then she went down the stairs and out the front door and across the porch. She went around the side of the house where the clothesline was. The dead bird grave was there, and the basket was full of soggy clothes. “Well, he’ll be hanging those up again,” she said. “When he comes out from wherever he’s hiding.” She opened the door of the shed and poked around. I hugged Jenny the Head tight and stayed right behind her. “I don’t know where that boy’s got to.” Then she went back to the front of the house and walked up the driveway to the circle. Muck stuck to her slippers, and she waved at Darrell. He was digging dandelions out of Aunt Erma’s lawn, but he stopped when Gloria called out, “You seen Rowan?”

“Nope. Not this morning.”

“Early bird today, it seems!” She laughed, and Darrell shrugged. He threw the weeds into a bucket.

She turned around and pinched my chin. “What game’s he trying to play with me?”