Trash was being nosed about by dogs, which seemed to roam freely, thin-ribbed and snappish, the kind of dogs that were kicked by men. I had grown up with men like these, slapping off their hands and walking through their comments like it was nothing, faint music from a radio down the street. Men who would not think twice about staring at a woman. Men who carried guns and laid them out on tables when they came inside a house.

Men were coming out of the farmhouse now to look at us.

Then I saw a woman, standing in the doorway of a shed, blond-haired and small, a red-faced baby on her hip. I couldn’t see any emotion on the woman’s features, any fear or hope. She was shut down, as blank as the sky, a painting of a woman more than the real thing. Even the baby on her hip was silent.

One man broke away from the group at the farmhouse. He stepped down from the porch, spreading his arms wide. The others moved to let him pass. He had a kind of glow about him. I recognized it. He was in charge.

“Welcome!” the man was saying, loud enough to hear from the truck. He wore a fuzzy hat and a long wool coat. I noticed his gun when he outstretched his arms, causing his coat to flap open. A handgun, holstered at his waist. Other than the coat and hat, he wasn’t dressed right. Not for work, not for the weather. He wore a muscle shirt under his coat. And—I couldn’t believe what I was seeing—he wore flip-flops. “Come out, come out!” he shouted, gesturing to us like we were children.

Dance put the truck into Park. We all looked at each other.

“If we die here—” Grayson said.

“We’re not going to die,” Dance said. “Wil—”

“Nobody say anything about the seeds,” I said. “Or the grow lights. Or me being a grower. Nothing. You hear me?”

“Okay,” Grayson said. “You can trust us.”

I looked at him. I looked at Dance. “We’re going to get out of this,” I said.

I opened the door.

First I noticed the smell, noxious and oily. Burned gasoline in the air. The sour smell of the trash. Fire popped in one of the barrels. I thought I heard a baby crying.

“Heard you got some skills,” the man said. “My boys radioed ahead.”

“Your phones work?” Dance couldn’t keep the hopefulness from his voice.

“Walkie-talkies,” the man said. “We’re old-school here. Well, welcome, welcome. I’m Jake. And this is my utopia.” He indicated the unfinished house, the cars, the sheds.

Someone had pulled a TV out onto the patch of dirt in front of the farmhouse. A tractor tire was positioned before it, like a La-Z-Boy, surrounded by empty cans. An extension cord, patched with tape, snaked back into the house.

“What is this place?” Dance asked.