The sound grows louder and more distinct. Bicycles are strewn about the little clearing in the woods. Leaning against a big oak tree, others lying on one side, some with wheels, some without. A headless doll, buckets. Wads of trash and a dirt path curving and leading to an orange-and-gray tent on the left. A blue-and-gray tent on the right. Beyond these, several lawn chairs. Then everything opens to a clearing with tarps spread out over poles and tree limbs to create a shelter. Young men and women sit around in lawn and camp chairs or on the ground. Grimy faces and matted hair. Greasy. Dreadlocked. Twisted and braided. It’s a combination of styles, with “ungroomed” the prevalent theme. Some are smoking. Mouths chewing. Shooting the shit. Eyes reading books. And when some of those eyes look up and see Cinnamon, bodies rise and come forward with arms spread wide. Offering warm, heartfelt hugs.

“Cinnamon!”

“Where-all have you been? Dredd’s been wondering about you.”

“Was up north. West Virginia.”

“You’ve brought guests?”

“Meet Anne and Trot.”

A young woman comes forward with warm hugs for Anne and Trot. Her blond hair, brown at the roots, is braided with beads on the ends. A leather dog collar around her neck. Fingers like twigs. She’s milky-fleshed, wearing a Ramones T-shirt. Torn black knee-high socks and a raggedy scarf-like skirt. “I’m Canary. A friend of Cinnamon’s is a friend of mine. Welcome to the jungle.”

Anne is overwhelmed with emotion. She tells Canary, “Nice to meet you.”

“Let’s mingle, let you get acquainted and make yourselves at home,” Cinnamon says, pulling them away from Canary.

Home. This grubby, cluttery little clearing in the woods is the first place that ever felt like home. Her mind tingles with the thought. Just arrived among strangers, and she has already been hugged—offered more warmth from another human being than she encountered in her entire seventeen years with her blood kin.

Walking past more tents. Chairs. Rocks placed in a circle for a fire pit that is still smoldering. They step over scattered trash, trampled and mashed underfoot. And there it is: the smell of food—soup or stew, maybe. They follow their noses to a row of tents set up with vestibules and entry areas and spaced out like neighbors with yards. Some are orange, others green, blue, brown. Tarps stretch over tree limbs to wooden pallet walls bounding a large area like a kitchen and living room all in one. Milk crates abound, some for sitting, others stacked and used as bookshelves. Suitcases and backpacks lie about. Empty food cans litter a table built from scrap two-by-fours and a door. The ground is thick with beer bottles. Clothing hangs from a rope stretched between saplings. On a pink plush couch with no feet, two thin-faced teens sit reading.