Ruth laughed. “Okay, fine. I was just wondering about your brother. What he was like.”

Silas didn’t say anything. In his silence, the sounds of the forest seemed to overcompensate.

“I’m sorry, see? I shouldn’t be allowed to talk!”

Ruth made a fist around the rock in her hand and slammed it into her face.

“Whoa, be careful!” Silas said, knocking the rock to the ground. He took her chin in his hand and looked at her skin. It remained untouched. Flawless.

“I’m sorry,” Ruth said again, her voice quieter now.

“Just be careful.”

“No, I’m sorry I came. I shouldn’t be here. You don’t deserve this.”

She sat back with a thump.

“You’re too hard on yourself; you know that?” Silas asked, wiping a piece of dirt from her cheek with his thumb. She closed her eyes against his hand.

“My brother was my best friend,” he said, but then he shook his head. “No, you know what? That’s not right. That’s the kind of thing I’m supposed to say. He wasn’t my best friend; he was my big brother. But unless you have a big brother, it’s hard to explain the difference. Do you have any siblings?”

Ruth shook her head.

“Just me,” she said. “My dad has another daughter; she’s five. But I’ve never met her.”

“Well, Philip was part idol, part embarrassment, part best friend, part tormentor.”

Silas looked at her as she reached again for the bag of rocks, settling into the routine.

“Imagine one part current boy-band hottie of the week, plus Mickey, plus your dad. Plus a military-grade information retrieval specialist.”

Ruth wrinkled her nose. “That sounds awful!”

Silas laughed full out and loudly enough that Ruth couldn’t help but join him.

“Okay, well, imagine it as cool.”

Ruth gave an exaggerated shudder but kept smiling. Silas went on.

“He did a bad thing, but he wasn’t a bad man. Do you know the difference?”

“I think so,” Ruth said. She inched closer to Silas, following the pattern of the rocks. Silas dug deeper into the cool earth.

“It’s an important distinction,” he said. He could be touching ground from years ago, he thought. He could be touching the same dirt from that very night. “He taught me everything I know.”

Ruth reached for a rock past Silas, her shoulder darting under and against his chest. She waited a beat for her fingers to clasp around it, to find their grip. He stayed above her, fighting the urge to free his hands. Fighting the urge to put them anywhere but right there in the dirt.

“Then he must be a good man,” she said, her voice in his ear before she pulled back, the rock freed and larger for it.

PEYOTE