LITMIR.BIZ

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      The man peered at the house. But there was a faraway look in his eyes. “I remember that pond. I designed it.”

      “No one designed it. It’s just a pond.”

      “I believe I may have lost something in that pond.”

      “Look,” I said. “I’m going to call my grandma—”

      “I believe I may have drowned in that pond.”

      I turned and ran up the driveway.

      Two figures were coming down toward me from the direction of the house: Tom and Clara. “Hey,” I said, waving my arms. “We need to call the cops. There’s a guy down there. A crazy guy.”

      “Where?” Tom said.

      I turned to show him.

      But the man was gone. I hadn’t seen a car, hadn’t heard an engine. There was no one in the road. A breeze rustled through the trees, knocking branches together, drifting my hair in front of my face. I realized I was shaking.

      “Are you all right?” Tom asked.

      “She’s green,” Clara said. “Completely green. I told you, Tom. She needs us.”

      “There was a man,” I said. “I swear it.”

      “I believe you,” Tom said. “What did he look like?”

      “Strange. Black hair. Black clothes.”

      They exchanged a glance.

      “What?” I said.

      “We know him,” Tom said. “He’s a character. Harmless, though.”

      “Completely rolled,” Clara said.

      “Harmless, Esmé,” Tom repeated.

      And I felt something when he said my name. It was a sudden lift, like a weight had been taken from me, like I had felt in the tunnel when the subway worker had pulled me away, before I knew what was happening, before I knew the fallout; I had thought I was flying.

      Tom held out his hand. “Come on. We want to tell you something.”

      Tom held my hand most of the way. His touch felt light and tenuous, like I was trying to hold onto a leaf. We walked behind the house, by the pond. I tried not to look at it as we passed. It was only an ugly old pond. Stories were just stories.

      Clara led us around the back of the barn, then stopped. “We’re here.”

      “What’s here?” I asked.

      Tom dropped my hand. “A home base, of sorts. At least for Clara.”

      We stood in the grass by the barn before an oak tree with big exposed roots. At the base of the trunk rested a pile of old bricks with a hole at the middle, like a pizza oven. Protruding from the top of the brick pile was a chimney.

      “It’s a kiln,” Tom said. “Not used anymore, if it ever was. It’s just the secret entrance to a tunnel.”

      “A what?” I said.

      “That’s what we want to show you. It’s one of Clara’s favorite places. It’s perfectly safe,” he said when I looked at him. “Come on. Clara will go first.”

      Clara hiked her skirt with one hand, and bent under the archway of bricks, into the mouth of the kiln. She gave a trilling whistle, like a bird. Then she was gone.

      “Whoa,” I said.

      “It’s just a tunnel, Ez.”

      “I don’t do so great with tunnels.”

      “It’s just a way in. And there are steps in there, a ladder. You don’t even have to jump. Come on. I’ll help you.”

      What had he called me?

      Ez.

      No one had ever called me that before.

      Tom took my hand, and led me into the kiln. At first, all I saw was blackness, then I could make out some kind of passageway a few feet below. Something protruded from the wall: a ladder made of bricks. I clutched Tom’s hand, and with my other, reached blindly. My fingers found a brick. I let go of Tom and called, “I’ve got it.”

      “Finally,” Clara muttered below me.

      I climbed down the ladder, Tom following close behind. When I leapt from the last step, I landed on packed earth, and moved over for Tom, who jumped down beside me. “How far down are we?” I asked.

      “Six feet,” Tom said.

      I thought of the barn, six feet above us, the fields, the pond.

      “This way,” Tom said.

      He was holding my hand again. We moved forward, crouching for a few dim steps, then my eyes adjusted, the tunnel opened, and I could stand upright. The passageway extended for as long as I could see, wide enough for Tom, Clara, and me to stand abreast.

      “What is this place?” I asked. My voice was a whisper, but it bounced off the walls.

      “What it was,” Tom said, “was part of the Underground Railroad.”

      “Really? I thought that was just an expression. Not actual tunnels.”

      “There were some tunnels.”

      “Is it safe? How long does it go on?”

      “All the way to your grandmother’s house.”

      “My grandmother’s house was a stop on the Underground Railroad?”

      It made sense. The house was old enough.

      And big and strange enough.

      I touched the smooth brick walls of the tunnel with my hand. The air felt cold and thin. The subway tunnel came back to me then: the darkness, the door, the pain in my forehead when I had struck the wall. I pressed on my temples. “Wait,” I said. “You said this is home? A home base? You live here?” I thought of Tom’s clothes, how raggedy they were, how he had worn the same outfit. “Are you runaways?”

      My eyes had adjusted fully now. I could see the dirt floors of the tunnel, packed and swept. Clean, as clean as floors of dirt could be. But bare. There were no sleeping bags, no blankets, no signs of food, no signs of life. How were they living here?

      “Why?” I said. “Why did you run away? Where are your parents?”

      “Don’t know anymore,” Tom said.

      “Do you have enough to eat? How long have you been down here?”

      “It’s fine, Ez,” Tom said, more softly. “We’re fine.”

      “Is it safe? Is someone looking for you?”

      “Yes,” Clara said. She was right up next to me. She smelled of talcum powder and dirt, and there were circles under her eyes, wide and purple as the circles under the eyes of the man in the driveway. “Someone is looking. And he finds us just about every night.”

      “Stop it, Clara,” Tom said. “You’re scaring her.”

      I hugged my arms to my chest. I was freezing.

      “Are you all right?”

      “Just cold,” I said.

      “No, you’re not,” Clara said.

      “Excuse me?”

      “Clara,” Tom said.

      But she answered, “We’re not helping her. She has to know.” Clara turned to me. “You’re not cold. You’re not hungry. You’re not thirsty. You’re just tired.” She stood right in my face, her eyes hard. “Stop pretending to be those other things. You can’t be those other things anymore, not ever again. Just tired. All you’ll ever be is tired. And you’ll

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