“What are we saying here?” This was Alicia. “Okay, I agree it’s strange about the boys. But this … I don’t know, Sara.”

Sara turned to face Alicia, squaring her shoulders combatively. “You’re the one who thinks she saw a girl who died fifteen years ago. She’d be, what, in her midtwenties now? How would you know it was Liza Chou?”

“I told you. The scar. And I think I know a Chou when I see one.”

“And that means we’re supposed to take your word for it?”

Sara’s sharp tone seemed to bristle through Alicia. “I don’t care if you do or not. I saw what I saw.”

Peter had heard all he wanted to. “Both of you, enough.” The two women were glowering at each other. “This isn’t going to solve anything. What’s the matter with you?”

Neither woman answered; the tension in the room was palpable. Then Alicia sighed and flopped back on the cot again.

“Forget it. I’m just tired of waiting. I can’t sleep at all in this place. It’s so goddamn hot, I have nightmares all night long.”

For a moment no one spoke.

“The fat woman?” Hollis said.

Alicia sat up quickly. “What did you say?”

“In the kitchen.” His voice was grave. “From the Time Before.”

Caleb stepped toward them from the door. “I tell you, the boy isn’t just dumb … ”

Sara finished for him: “ … he’s been struck dumb.” Her face was astonished. “I’m dreaming about her, too.”

Everyone was looking at Peter now. What were his friends talking about? What fat lady?

He shook his head. “Sorry.”

“But the rest of us are having the same dream,” said Sara.

Hollis rubbed his beard, nodding. “It would appear so.”

Michael had been drifting in and out of a formless sleep when he heard the door opening. A girl stepped around the screen. Younger than Billie, but with the same funny orange costume and severe haircut. She was holding a tray before her.

“I thought you might be hungry.”

As she advanced into the room, the smell of warm food hit Michael’s senses like an electric current. He was suddenly ravenous. The girl placed the tray on his lap: some kind of meat in a brown gravy, boiled greens, and, most wondrous of all, a fat slice of buttered bread. Metal utensils lay beside it, wrapped in a rough cloth.

“I’m Michael,” he offered.

The girl nodded faintly, smiling. Why was everybody always smiling?

“I’m Mira.” She was blushing, he saw. What little hair she possessed was so fair it was practically white, like a Little’s. “I was the one who took care of you.”

Michael wondered what this meant exactly. In the hours since he’d awakened, bits of memory had come floating back to him. The sound of voices, shapes and bodies moving around him, water on his body and moistening his mouth.