Just like that, they were alone.
A hush fell on the bus. Ollie peered out the window, but couldn’t see Mr. Easton. It was as though he’d been swallowed. The mist was creeping closer.
Mike and Phil began busily sticking Coco Zintner’s long hair to the back of her seat with a wad of chewing gum. The lights flickered again. Ollie’s watch chimed once, softly, against her wrist. She glanced down: 39:22, said the countdown now.RUN, said the compass display, flickering.
Ollie’s mouth was dry. Go out into the gray evening, into the misty forest?RUNstill flickered beneath the cracked screen. Overhead the lights wavered.
The driver sat perfectly still.
Coco began to move her head in confusion. Mike and Phil sat back, looking innocent. Coco’s furious scream shot through the bus. Exclamations and laughter erupted as Coco yanked her hair up from the seat back, trailing sticky strings of gum.
Coco began to cry.
I could warn everyone,Ollie thought.But warn them about what?She was shaking with nerves and indecision. She looked out the window again. Straight ahead was the road. To the right was the forest. Out the left-hand window was a vast, whispering cornfield.
Ollie’s stomach jumped. The field was full of scarecrows. Were there—moreof them? No, impossible.
Not impossible,Ollie thought shakily.Very improbable.
Ollie checked her phone one more time.NOSERVICE.Well,she thought determinedly,I don’t want to stay on this stupid bus anyway.Ollie put on her rain jacket and her hat. She hoisted her polka-dot backpack higher on her shoulders.
“What are you doing, Ollie?” asked Brian. Coco was still crying. People were shouting questions at the bus driver, but he just sat there, unmoving, two hands on the wheel. The day’s sun was only a memory.
Ollie said, “The driver said best get moving. I’m moving.”
“What?” said Brian. “Where? Mr. Easton said—”
But Ollie wasn’t listening. She stood up, went to the front of the bus, and looked back at her classmates. In a little place like Ben Withers, everyone knew everyone else. You went to school with the same people since kindergarten. Ollie was pretty sure no one was going to believe her. She barely believed it herself. But—what if it was true? All of it? The mist and the twilight, the bus driver’s warning.
“Mr. Easton is gone,” said Ollie, facing everyone down the bus aisle. She didn’t think she could shout over all the noise, so she didn’t try. But the people in the back shushed each other anyway. “I don’t—I think maybe he’s not coming back.”
A startled pause, and then they laughed at her, or just rolled their eyes, or looked concerned.Poor Ollie; you know she cracked last year.“Come on,” said a blurry chorus ofvoices. “He just went to the farm. He’ll be back soon. He’s not gone. He can’t be gone.”
“Gone!” Ollie snapped.
The word seemed to fall like a rock, right into all the noise. Everyone heard it, and a small, awkward stillness spread through the bus. “He went into the mist,” she added. “Now it’s almost dark.” She could see her own breath now, Ollie realized. The bus was getting cold. The engine was turned off. The heater wasn’t running. “Did you hear the driver?” she asked. “Best get moving,he said.”
Another murmur ran through the bus. “Get moving?”
“What is she saying?”
“But Mr. Easton said he’d be right back!”
“Oh, it’s just Ollie. You know she—”
“Our phones don’t work,” Ollie said, her voice getting stronger. “I don’t think Mr. Easton is coming back. And I don’t think whoever comes will want to help.”
A few people were smiling, as though she’d made a good joke. Others looked concerned. The bus driver gave Ollie a sly grin.Nice try.Brian Battersby sat with his arms crossed, a frown on his face.
“Okay,” said Ollie. “I said it. I think you should listen. I’m going to try and get away now.”
She put her foot on the first step.
“Little girl,” said the bus driver.
She turned around, looked into eyes like two eggs, felta fresh jolt of fear. “Avoid large places at night,” he said. “Keep to small.”
“What does that mean?” Ollie demanded.
