The door closed and the ambulance shifted beneath her and then they really were moving, bumping down the driveway. She could see the men with the pale blue eyes again and she could see her husband’s face and she wished that she’d been able to send the message herself. The officer had better get it right. There were two of them, and they were evil. Maybe she should have used that word in the message. Maybe she should have been clearer. She had said that two friends were coming, but that was so far from the truth.
Evil was coming.
This time the dream was different, gentler in its layers but more evil in its content. This time the boy was coming for Hannah. He was walking right toward her, wearing a headlamp, marching to her tower, and she was terrified of him and whatever message he carried.
You’ve lost your mind, she thought, staring out the window as the boy with the lamp reached the base of the tower steps and began to come up them, the steel rattling against his feet.
He couldn’t be real. A boy just like the one who haunted her, walking out of the night woods, out of the mountains, all alone and bound for her as if he’d been marching toward her all this time?
The terrible thing stopped after ten steps, though. Held tightly to the rail, looked up at her tower and then back down. Came up another few steps in a rush, moving awkwardly with the weight of an outsize pack on his back, then stopped again and put both hands on the step in front of him. Holding on to it as if for balance.
Hannah was still developing her theory of ghosts and she didn’t understand much about them, but one thing she was sure of: they weren’t afraid of heights.
She rose from the bunk and walked to the door, and down below the boy began his surreal ascent from the blackness again, the white beam of light guiding him toward her. She opened the door, stepped out into the night, and shouted, “Stop!”
He nearly fell off the tower. Stumbled into the rail, gave a little cry, and slipped sideways; the pack caught him and kept him from sliding down the steps.
Ghosts were not scared of the living. Nightmares didn’t tremble at the sound of your voice.
“Are you okay?” she called.
He didn’t answer, and she started down the steps. He watched her come, the headlamp shining directly into her eyes.
“Please turn that light off.”
He reached up and fumbled with it and clicked something and then the light shifted from harsh white to an eerie crimson glow. A setting designed to protect your night vision. She walked down until she could see him.
He bore no resemblance to the boy from her memories. He was older and taller, with dark hair instead of blond. His face was covered with dirt and scratches and sweat, and he was breathing hard. He’d been walking for a while.
“Where did you come from?”
“I’m…I got lost. Heading back to camp.”
“You’re camping?”
He nodded. She was close enough now to see that there were streaks on his face where tears had cleared the dirt.
“You’re with your parents?”
“No. I mean…not anymore. Not now.”
It was a strange answer, and his eyes made it even stranger. Flicking around like there were options all about and he needed to find the right one. For a yes-or-no answer? Hannah looked at him and tried to see what she was missing. There was something. He was dressed for camping, yes, and he had the pack and the headlamp, all the proper equipment, but…
The pack. Why was he still wearing it if he’d gotten lost on his way back to camp?
“How long ago did you wander off?”
“I don’t know. Couple hours.”
That put him strapping a full pack on after midnight. A pretty serious bathroom run.
“What’s your name?” she said.
Again the flicker of the eyes. “Connor.”
“Your parents are out there somewhere, but you don’t know how to find your way back?”
“Yeah. I need to get in touch with them.”
“I’d say so.”
“You have a phone up there?” he asked.
“A radio. We’ll call for help. Come on up. We’ll get it straightened out.”
He got to his feet slowly. Holding to the railing as if he fully expected the stairs to collapse beneath him and leave him dangling from it. She turned and led the way up to the cab. The moon was descending, and in the eastern sky there were the first perceptible lightening shades of dawn. She’d been awake until well past midnight listening to the reports from the fire line. They’d failed to contain the flames before dark and had called for a second hotshot crew to help. In the morning, she expected there would be discussion of a helitack unit. For a brief time, there had been added excitement when reports of a second flare-up a few miles away came in, but that turned out to be a house fire, quickly extinguished. Now it was just the one blaze out there in the night. The wind that had picked up at dusk had blown steadily all through the night and showed no sign of wanting to lie down in front of the oncoming day.
Poor kid, she thought. Whatever he wasn’t telling her-and there was something-he needed to get the hell out of these mountains and back to his family. She wondered if he had run away from them. That would explain the full pack and the hesitant answers. It was none of her business. All she had to do was make sure he got to safety. A more active role than she’d expected to have this summer.
She reached the top of the cab and turned on the overhead lights and waited while he made his way up. She’d been going slow but he still had fallen well behind. Even when the lights went on in the cab, he didn’t look up from his boots. Step, step, pause. Step, step, pause. Never glancing up or to the sides.
“Here we are,” she said. “My little kingdom. Where did you come from? Do you know the name of the campsite, or a landmark? I’ll need to offer instructions to find your family.”
Again, that strange expression overtook him. As if he didn’t have an answer ready and needed time to consider before offering one. It wasn’t a deceptive look, just uncertain.
“Who do you call on the radio?” he said.
“People who can help.”
“Right. But…who, exactly? Police?”
“Are you worried about the police?”
“No,” the boy said.
“Do you need the police?”
“It’s just…I’m curious. I need to know, that’s all.”
“What do you need to know?”
“Who exactly answers the radio?”
“Dispatch for firefighters. But from there, they’ll call whoever you need.”
He frowned. “Firefighters.”
“Yes.”
“Who can hear what they say?”
“Pardon?”
“Is it just…is it two-way communication?”
“Two-way communication?” she echoed. “I’m not sure that I follow.”
“Can other people hear what you say? Like, is it just you and another person, the way it would be on a phone? Or can other people listen? On other radios?”
“Hon,” she said, “you need to tell me what the real problem is here. Okay?”
He didn’t answer.
“Where did you really come from?” she said.
He let his eyes drift away from hers. They settled on the Osborne. He wandered over to it and stared at the map, silent, then leaned down, investigating it.
Autistic, maybe, she thought. Or-what’s that other condition? When a kid is really smart but you ask him a normal question and he ignores it? Whatever that condition is, this kid has it.
“If you don’t remember, that’s okay. I’ll just need to explain what-”
“I’d say we were right…there.” He had his index finger on the topographic map. She was too intrigued by him now to just repeat the question, so instead she went to his side and looked at where he was pointing.