“Then write the biggest book report ever, Malorie. And hand in the one about Mom’s book a week later. Trust me…Mrs. Cohn will never look at you the same way again.”

Footsteps near, someone on the lawn. The trees part, and Malorie sees Mom.

“Found her,” Mary Walsh says.

She steps into the darkness, too. It’s comforting, in its way, being in the dark with the two of them. They can’t see her face, can’t see that she’s embarrassed. At the same time, she can say exactly what she wants to, how she feels, without worrying what she looks like while doing it.

“Cold out here,” Mom says.

“I was gonna sleep here,” Malorie says.

“Were you?” Then, “Well, I hope you thought to bring a flashlight.”

Malorie feels what she at first thinks is her mom’s hand against her own. But it’s not. It’s the book. The adult one.

She takes it.

“Can’t imagine us ever telling you not to read a book,” Mom says. “And it’s a good one.”

“Thanks,” Malorie says. She doesn’t want to cry. Doesn’t want them to think she’s weak.

The trees part again.

Shannon.

“What’s up, Mal?” she says. “You ran away to the backyard?”

“Shut up,” Malorie says.

But Dad laughs. And then Mom laughs. And then Malorie laughs, too. She can’t help it and she can’t stop it. Even more, she doesn’t want to.

“I read the kids’ book while you were hiding,” Shannon says.

“It sucks,” Malorie says.

“You haven’t read it!”

It’s true.

“Is it good?” she asks.

“No,” Shannon says. “It’s really not.”

They laugh again.

Dad sits down, cross-legged, in the pine needles and dirt.

Mom joins him.

Shannon, too.

Then, thinking these three are the only three she’ll ever let into her new clubhouse, Malorie sits, too.

And they talk.

And Malorie, a young girl yet, thinks how a parent will always find their kid. Even if they run away. Even if they’re hiding in the dark. And she knows, without a teacher telling her so, that this lesson will stick with her for the rest of her life.

TWENTY-SIX

Malorie wakes.

Smells dirt.

An old-world instinct tells her to open her eyes.

A sense of cold air, of being outside, tells her not to.

“What…”

She feels the cold air on her eyelids. She hasn’t felt this in a decade or more.

The outside world on her naked eyes.

“What…”

She raises her arms, feels nothing above her. She reaches out to her sides. Feels dirt.

She smells it. The dirt. A cellar smell.

Her head hurts in a way it hasn’t before. This isn’t a headache. This isn’t lack of sleep. This is an injury.

And she’s not wearing her fold.

She sits up, arms extended, as though prepared to strike whoever must be near.