Page 38

Hollis brushed the frost from his coat, wiped his nose, and started heading back toward town. It had begun to snow. He wiggled his feet in his shoes to make sure he still could. He should have been more careful.

At the edge of the woods, at the tree line before grass and sidewalk began, there was another person. It was... some guy.

Maybe a little younger than him.

He was standing so still.

Before Hollis could try to hide, slow down, or move quieter than he already was, the boy turned and looked at him.

Hollis stopped and stared right back.

“What are you doing in there?” the boy asked.

He was... His face was sharp, like an owl’s. He had blond hair, nearly white, and his cheeks were bright red with cold. Everything of his was red with cold. He wasn’t wearing gloves, wasn’t wearing a winter coat; he looked like he’d fallen out of a portal to spring and been abandoned on the side of the road.

Hollis opened his mouth and closed it, then opened it again. “Are you okay?”

The boy frowned in surprise, then looked very annoyed.

“Are you ? I’m not the one with ice tracks on my face, pal. You been crying?” he replied mercilessly. “Why are y’crying in the woods? Are you lost or whatever? You look a bit old to be lost.”

Rude. Hollis scowled back.

“I’m not lost. Why aren’t you wearing a coat?”

The boy folded his arms tight. “Because I don’t got one, obviously. If I had one, I’d be in it.”

Hollis rubbed a hand over his face, knocking off some of the ice crystals roughly.

“Whatever, man, but fucking Christ, you scared the hell out of me.”

“I scared you ? All I’ve been doing is standing here. You’re the one emerging from the forest like a jackal. What are the waterworks about anyway? How warm you are in your winter clothes?”

Hollis sighed really loudly and began unzipping his coat. It was thirty degrees outside and about to get colder. This was obviously some kind of drifter in an emergency—regardless of his terrible personality. Hollis’s house was close enough that he could make it all the way in his sweatshirt.

Plus, he still had last year’s coat in a closet somewhere....

“Here.”

The boy stared at it. “For free?” he asked.

Hollis immediately felt sad. The kind of sad that has nothing to do with yourself.

“Yeah. I can... get another one.”

The boy took the coat and put it on slowly, staring at Hollis, wary and defensive.

“Something happened to me at school today. I wasn’t crying on purpose; I was trying not to.”