Now I know this wasn’t what she meant.

I didn’t notice the apple tree the other night. It was dark. Very late. I only noticed the clearing. The rusty remains of an old threshing machine, like the dried carcass of a grasshopper. The convenient stones left from a house or barn that must have tumbled down in this spot long ago. But Aunt Mae must have seen the withered apple tree. She must have known. She’s helping to guide me back.

On the ground, several yards from the apple tree’s bent trunk, I find the pile of stones I left behind. I brush aside the disguise of leaves and needles and twigs. The cell phone, dead faced and shiny as a mirror, lies beneath. I pick it up and slide it into my jeans pocket.

I straighten and take another look at the apple tree.

It’s clearly ancient. It’s warped and gray and nearly dead, cut off from sunlight by the canopy that’s grown above. Its arms twist sideways, reaching for something, never quite catching it. A few tiny, worm-blackened apples dangle from its twigs.

I’m still looking at it when I hear the sound. A small sound. A shift in the leaves.

I skirt the apple tree. Ahead of me is a crumbled stone wall. Past the wall, in a deep hole that used to be a cellar, coated with mud and moss and decaying leaves and other long-dead things, is a creature.

It’s small and furred. It’s the color of wet dust.

At first I’m not even sure if it’s alive. But then it moves. Two reflective gold eyes stare up at me.

Mrrk? it breathes.

It’s a cat.

It’s his cat.

I’ve seen it stalking around Anders’s yard, bony shoulders working, long tail flicking. But even without those memories, I’d know this cat. His touch is all over it. I swear, I can even smell him.

This is what Aunt Mae saw. This is where she was guiding me.

“Hello,” I whisper. I crouch on the edge of the hole. It’s deep, rotting, slick sided. With a wrong move, I might be stuck down there, too. And wouldn’t the woods love that.

I glance all around. Nothing nearby. No one to see.

I stride back to the hulk of the ancient combine.

It’s heavy. Its bottom edges are buried in years of damp earth. It takes me more than one try to lift it out of the ground and then to drag it to the edge of the crumbling cellar. I tip it in.

It creaks as it hits the mud below, but the old machinery stays intact.

I climb down its side into the cellar. Rotting leaves sink under my shoes. Mud and standing water suck at my feet as I step, slowly, closer to the cat.

I remember its name. I’ve heard him use it. I’ve seen him, through his window, stroking this same gray fur.

“Hi, Goblin,” I whisper.

The cat is a long way from home. It didn’t come here on its own, of course. They caught it. They brought it here. The woods would have swallowed it up for good.