He was done eating by twelve forty-five, but the Twilight Zone episode he was watching was a good one, so he waited until it was over before heading to the bookstore. Taking his bike out of the garage, Nick thought about how far it was to Brave New World, and how, even if he took the shortcut, he would have to pedal up the high hill on Bluff Road.

He needed his own car.

But his parents were adamant that he was not going to get one until he graduated from high school—and then only if he maintained a 3.5 average his senior year.

He rode his bike out of their neighborhood, onto the highway and toward downtown, staying as close to the shoulder as possible. The high school’s lunch period was over, but in a small redneck burg like Montgomery, teenagers weren’t the only ones who liked to swerve their pickups in order to scare bicyclists.

The afternoon was warm, and Nick was sweating by the time he approached the center of town. Frowning, he looked to his left. Was that his mom’s car in front of the nursery? She was a plant lover with an impressive yardful of flowers that had been a stop on the Montgomery Garden Tour last year, so there was nothing inherently unusual about her spending her lunch hour looking at plants. But the sight of her Kia parked in the gravel lot gave him an uneasy feeling. He couldn’t say why, or what about it felt wrong, but something sure did, and he found himself pedaling faster in order to get away from the nursery before she came out and saw him.

He turned onto Main.

Ordinarily, he would have ridden his bike through the alley to the back of the store, but the last time he’d done that, he’d gotten a nail in his tire. Not wanting to risk another flat, he got off his bike at the gas station and walked it along the sidewalk the rest of the way down the block.

There was a big white sign in the dingy window of the empty storefront next to Brave New World, and he stopped to check it out. The sign stated that the space was to be the new home of The First People’s Bank. Nick was surprised. A bank in a narrow, crappy little spot like this? That made no sense. There was movement behind the window, a furtive shifting from one side of the room to the other, though the darkness and dirty glass would not let him see the figure clearly.

He purposely turned away, not wanting to see it.

As pathetic as it was, and as impossible as it might seem to be frightened in the middle of the day on a public street, he was frightened. Something about the figure’s quick jerky moves reminded him of a nightmare he’d had, and Nick pushed his bike forward, opening the door of the bookshop and pulling the cycle in behind him.