“That’s sad.” I looked around at the chimes again. “Do you think they’ll leave these alone? Someone went to a lot oftrouble.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “I wondered if they were Molly’s, at first. She was super into stuff like this. But most of these look new. Metal’s barely rusted.” He lifted a hand to the closest set of chimes and frownedagain.
“You don’t like them? Mystical, kind of. Like a real-life version of relaxation songs. You’ve got water, and chimes, and trees. It’spretty.”
“Prettyweird, if Frank and Myrna didn’t set this up.” He took out his phone and snapped a couple of pictures before sliding it away. “But as far as I can tell without a map, all this will be part of the new visitor center areaanyway.”
I frowned. “That’s too bad. It seems wrong to change a place as natural and perfect as thisone.”
“This from the man who was convinced we’d be mauled bysquirrels?”
“Not here. The chimes would protectus.”
Si managed to frown and raise one eyebrow at the same time. The epitome of intrigue anddisbelief.
I sighed. “In a lot of different cultures, wind chimes repel evil spirits and attract good ones. It’s athing. The chimes exist in a place between the physical and spiritualworlds.”
“Where did you learn all this?” he demanded, not annoyed but fascinated. “Do you believe init?”
“I don’tnotbelieve in it, I guess. And I learned because my grandmother was… you know, into this stuff. New agethings.”
“Not Anna,” Si said. “There’s noway.”
“Oh my God, no. Can you imagine? Grandpa Hen would’ve birthed kittens. No, my dad’s mom. She lived near us in Boston.” I elbowed him lightly. “She’s the one to blame for my superstitiousnature.”
One side of his mouth turned up in a smile. “Then I think I would have liked her. How about if we head back to the car, I’ll let Dare know about thisplace,and then I can take you back to my house. I, uh, have something ofyours.”
“Something of mine?” My eyes narrowed, but he clapped a hand over my mouth before I could speakagain.
“Yes, something of yours. Yes, back at my house. No, I don’t have a dungeon, but keep it up and you might inspire me to build one. No, I don’t have candy, little boy, but we have your water bottles, and there are still no banjos, just freaky, weird chimes. Okay?” Helaughed.
I sighed, even though my heart was leaping. This guy just totallygotme. “Fine. If you wanna take all the fun out of thething.”
“Who gave you yoursuspiciousnature?”
I laughed. “Oh, that’s all me, I’mafraid.”
“Just trust me,” he said, tugging on myhand.
And I didn’t say it out loud, but I was pretty sure I alreadydid.
