“Who are you?” Allie demanded. “Why are you here?”
“Did you see the accident?” Nick added.
“No,” he said, choosing to answer Nick’s question only. “But I heard it. I went up to look.”
“What did you see?”
The kid shrugged. “Lots of stuff.”
“Were the other people in the cars all right?”
The kid turned and kicked a stone, angrily. “Why does it matter? Either they got better, or they got where they were going, and anyway there’s nothing you can do about it, so just forget about it, okay?”
Nick threw his hands up. “This is nuts! Why are we even talking to this kid? We have to get up there and find out what happened!”
“Can you just calm down for a second?”
“I am calm!” Nick screamed.
Allie knew there was something…off…about the whole situation. Whatever it was, it all seemed centered on this oddly dressed, freckle-faced boy.
“Can you take us to your home? We can call the police from there.”
“I don’t got a telly-phone.”
“Oh, that’s just great!” said Nick.
Allie turned on him. “Will you just shut up — you’re not helping.” Allie took a good long look at the freckled boy again. His clothes. The way he held himself.
She thought about the things he had said—not so much what he said, but the way he had said it. This is my place… now it’s your place, too. If her suspicions were correct, this situation was even weirder than she had thought.
“Where do you live?” Allie asked him.
“Here,” was all he said.
“How long have you been ‘here’?”
The Freckle-boy’s ears went red. “I don’t remember.”
By now Nick had come over, his frustration defused by what he was hearing.
“And your name?” Allie asked.
He couldn’t even look her in the eye. He looked down, shaking his head. “I haven’t needed one for a long time. So I lost it.”
“Whoa …” said Nick.
“Yeah,” said Allie. “Major whoa.”
“It’s okay,” said the boy. “I got used to it. You will, too. You’ll see. It’s not so bad.”
There were so many emotions for Allie to grapple with now—from fear to anger to misery— but for this boy, Allie could only feel pity. What must it have been like to be lost alone in the woods for years, afraid to leave?
“Do you remember how old you were when you got here?” she asked.
“Eleven,” he told them.
“Hmm,” said Nick. “You still look eleven to me.”