Threnody (033).

(This is a 500-word-a-day novel project.)

I don’t think he’s one of them, Ryan said quietly to Jesse. The monsters.

If he is, it’s a whole new kind, Jesse said. She watched him take the boy’s hand, kneeling down so they could be eye level. We got to go now, kid, so you want to come with us? She’s trying to get a heart, and I’m going to ask for a brain, and I figure the wizard can send you home.

The boy made a face. What’s a wizard? He made no attempt to follow the adults – they tried to get him to move with happy voices and gestures, but the boy merely stared at them uncomprehendingly.

I could pick him up, Ryan said – though by the tone in his voice Jesse could tell he did not want to do that, and she didn’t blame him. There was no nice, here.

They walked backward, calling to him one last time, and then he was out of sight behind the trees. Ryan swore loudly. It’s not your fault, she told him, you don’t even know what he is.

I don’t got to feel good about leaving him by himself, Ryan said crossly. This trip is really starting to suck.

Goodbye! They both jumped, wheeling, and saw the kid running to them, the T-shirt making him look like a little monk. Goodbye! he said. Goodbye!

You mean hello, Ryan said, reaching down and swinging the boy up on his shoulders, who shrieked in delight, slapping both arms around Ryan’s head tightly. Hey! Ryan said, laughing himself, prying the boy’s hands loose, and holding on to them to give him some sense of balance. Calm down, kid. I got about a dozen nephews, and trust me, I’m a long-time veteran of the shoulder ride, the horsey ride, the hanging-upside-down spin, and about a billion other tricks that’ll amaze you and make you toss your cookies.

You’re weird, the boy said.

You got that right, Ryan said. And though Jesse was glad to see her walking companion more relaxed and human than in all the time she’d known him, she was afraid of the boy and the questions that he presented – the kinds that were troubling even in this place of no answers.

They made a quick pace around the trunks of the giant trees, and where a stone had been tied around Ryan’s neck, it had for the moment fallen away: he talked almost non-stop to the boy, telling him jokes and rhymes and stories, all of which made the boy laugh until he seemed exhausted, hanging on Ryan’s back and resting his head on his shoulder and sometimes watching Jesse until she moved to the other side, out of his line of sight.

You don’t like kids? Ryan asked.

I like them fine, she said defensively. But he’s not a kid.

He seems normal enough, Ryan said when she didn’t speak. Only, maybe a little, uh, what’s the word. Empty, you know? Like he’s brand new or something.