I am standing at Moony’s bedroom door; it opens onto a field of yellow flowers like her curtains. The sun is setting and the sea of blooms pales to a diaphanous white. In the distance, the dying flowers begin to dance with a wind I can’t feel. I watch as they finally part like the pages of a book falling away from each other. The wolf emerges, bristly and arctic, yellow eyes gleaming as it leaps through the meadow toward a barrier of trees.

I follow, reaching the trees moments after the wolf, and squeeze between them. That’s when I see the boy. He stands under a low-hanging limb wearing a yellow waistcoat. He is taller than the wolf, but not by much. His face is odd, with eyes too large and cheeks too sharp and a chin that tapers to a point. A pack slung over one shoulder drips a menacing red at his heels. He grins, as if he has been waiting for me. He spins and takes off, the wolf sprinting beside him.

I press on, catching only flashes of golden waistcoat or moonbeam fur in the gloom ahead. Even though I run at full tilt, I can barely manage to keep their trail until I break into a clearing and see the boy standing, bright against a blackening sky. I open my mouth to call out, but he turns, his eyes dancing with mischief. I feel the hot tickle of deceit snaking through my bones. The wolf releases a low, mournful howl. The boy’s lips curl with the same wicked grin he wore earlier. And then he flings his body forward.

I watch, dumbfounded, as the wolf leaps wildly behind him and they both disappear.

I take off through the deep grass after them, skidding to a stop at its edge just before the earth drops out beneath my feet, my toes curling over the cliff’s face. Staring into a void of swiftly ascending night, it’s as if the world has been turned upside down, and the sky is beneath me instead of above. Laughter bubbles up through a tangle of clouds parting below. I hear the panting of a large animal behind me. I turn to see the boy with the yellow waistcoat standing there, his wolf sitting on dazzlingly white haunches beside him. His grin twists into something maniacal, and his arms spring out, propelling me over the edge into the yawning night.

I am out of time. I am out of earth. Everything washes black.