I crouch down, sweeping the grass aside. The name carved into the stone has faded, but even in the dim light I can read it:
Theodore Shorn
1943 - 1960
“Theodore Shorn,” I say out loud, and then, a second later, make the connection: Theo. Oliver said his friend’s name was Theo.
Any lingering trepidation melts away, replaced with a rush of pity. The realtor was right. No one lives out here. Oliver probably just followed the same path I did and saw the gravestone. What did he say about Theo? That he didn’t like living people and couldn’t leave his territory?
“Sounds like a ghost to me,” I say as I stand up. Not that I believe in ghosts, of course. But a sweet, lonely ten-year-old would. He might see a name on a sixty-year-old gravestone and give it to an imaginary friend. A ghost who can’t leave the confines of these overgrown woods.
Another gust of wind. More groans and creaks from the trees. More soft rustling.
And then a loud, suddensnap.
I freeze, my adrenaline spiking, even though I know it could be anything. A squirrel, a deer, a dead tree branch finally succumbing to its rot.
Still, I call out a shaky, “Hello?”
Nothing. No movement, no sounds but the insects and the wind.
“I’m leaving now,” I say, just in case, and then I flee.
6
THEO
Someone has come into my territory.
That’s all I know at first; I’m weeding the little vegetable patch I have out back when I catch a whiff of the citrusy scent of human fear. It’s startling; the hikers who come out usually don’t smell of fear, not anymore. There’s enough cell service, even on my peninsula, that no one’s ever truly lost.
But then the wind shifts, and I catch something under that fear. Something sweet and familiar.
Chloe. The trowel drops out of my hands and lands with a thump in the dirt.Oliver, I think, my heart hardening. But when I sniff the air, I don’t smell him at all. Just her.
The scent’s coming from the lake, and I have a momentary sense of panic. Am I supposed to kill her? That’s what I’ve always done when someone comes into my territory. The urge to do it is as overwhelming as rage. But I don’t feel either now. In fact, the idea of killing her makes me vaguely queasy.
However, I absolutely do not want her finding my cabin, or my garden, or any other evidence that I exist. I’m supposed to be a ghost.
Her scent rushes through the air again, and I bolt, moving quickly around the side of my cabin and darting into the thicktangle of trees, where I can at least crouch in the shadows and decide what to do next. Maybe I can scare her off, somehow.
But then I hear her voice for the first time.
“Hello?”
Just one word. It makes my heart jump around in my chest.
“Hi, I live across the lake!”
She’s definitely still down by the beach. I can tell by how her voice carries on the wind. But more than that, I’m struck by the sound of her voice itself—the soft, musical lilt of it. I’m struck in place, her scent wrapping around me. I don’t want to kill her. I don’t want to scare her, either.
I don’t know what I want to do.
Footsteps, faint and rustling. She’s moving into the trees.
I follow the sound trail she leaves behind. Like all the humans who stumble into my territory, she’s wildly noisy, and it’s easy to track her through the dappled light of the forest. She’s on the old footpath that Mom and I would use, the one that linked the cabin to the cemetery and then to the pier. The pier’s long gone. The cemetery isn’t.
I see Chloe’s trail before I seeher, a ripple through the dense underlayer in the forest. Her steps skitter over the fallen leaves, creating a riot of sound. I hide myself among the brush, my breath tight in my chest. Her fear has lessened into a kind of mild trepidation. It occurs to me, given the way the blood pounds in my temples, that maybe I’m the one who’s afraid now.
