I said, Altemonte, if we run we can make it home before breakfast but actually I was already running. Home beat so loud in my ears it was a while before I noticed Altemonte wasn’t running with me. I ran back. I could see Altemonte’s red rain boots sticking out of my cave, so I crawled in next to him. He was chewing on joe-pye. I said, What happened, did you hurt your ankle? Do you need me to make you a splint? I can carry you on my back. He said, You know that if you go home the police will just bring you back to my grandma’s house again. You can’t go home until the police say you can. I said, Altemonte, I don’t care about that. I know how to get out of most police holds. I know how to battle like a ton of enemies. Altemonte said, I knew you would say that. That’s why you’re my best friend. Extreme joyfulness then took over my body and I said, It’s okay if you hurt your ankle don’t worry, I’ll make you a stretcher out of pine boughs, wait here while I find some pine boughs. But Altemonte said, This is a deciduous forest so there aren’t any pine boughs. I didn’t hurt my ankle. I’m not going with you.

Back a long time ago when I was still trying to be super-popular at school, the Mean Aunt said, Perley, if your friend jumped over a cliff would you jump over a cliff? and I was like, Definitely. I said, If my friend jumped over a cliff, one of two things would be the case. Either they would be proving to me that jumping over a cliff is super-toxically amazing, so of course I would join in, or else, if it was my true friend that jumped over the cliff, I would be so lonely that I couldn’t bear it and I would jump over, too. Maybe I would catch my true friend in midair and then I would grab a tree branch and I would save us. But even if we both fell together to our deaths it would be better than being alone without my true friend. The Mean Aunt got all sick at that. No, no, she said. That’s not what a true friend would want you to do, she said. I should hug you, she said, but I’m covered in beaver intestines so just act like I’m hugging you. All right, I said, hugging myself.