The van labored closer.
“When they hit eighteen or nineteen, the crimes started getting less and less cute,” her mother said. “It was like Stan was trying to figure out how weak your dad was and how far he could push him. There was stuff so ugly that your father cried over it. Eventually, he and Stan got arrested for something—I don’t even remember what, I’ve blocked it out—and I gave him an ultimatum: him or me. We got married a year later. I don’t think he changed his last name to mine because he was some big romantic—I think he did it because he had a criminal record. Now, should I have told you all that when you were a kid, Zoe? About your father? Who was a big enough disappointment anyway? Should I tell Jonah? How do you think that would go?”
Zoe said nothing. X suspected she was crying. When her mother spoke again, her voice was hushed and kind.
“I’m grateful to X,” she said, “and that’s why I didn’t turn him in to the police. But, sweetie, I think Jonah’s getting too close to him.” She paused, as the van drew nearer. “And I know that you are.”
X was still waiting for Zoe to deny it when the van turned up the Bissells’ driveway, about a hundred yards away. The engine sounded absurdly, almost catastrophically, loud.
“Crap, it’s Rufus,” said Zoe’s mother. “What’s he doing here?”
“What do you think he’s doing?” Zoe said, still rattled by their conversation. “He’s obsessed with you, and it’s time for a new episode of World’s Slowest Courtship. ‘This week, Rufus starts growing a rose!’”
“Don’t do that,” her mother said. “If he heard you say something like that, it would really embarrass him.”
Rufus pulled up near the garage and killed the engine.
“Get X into the woods,” Zoe’s mother told her, “unless you think you can explain who he is to Rufus. Because I certainly can’t.”
The words jolted X. Why had he just been standing there, eavesdropping? He could not afford to be seen by yet another citizen of the Overworld. Every person who saw him was another person he endangered. He might as well have dangled them over a furnace.
He scanned the woods. He could reach them in an instant, but he feared he would alarm Jonah if he ran. He looked down at the boy. Jonah’s back was turned, and he was kneeling in the snow, fussing with Zoe’s scarf.
X headed for the trees. He forced himself to move slowly. It was agonizing. He was barely a hundred feet away when Jonah—apparently not as entranced by his game as X had imagined—stood up, brushed the snow off his knees, and began shouting: “Rufus! We’re in back! Come meet our new friend!”
Zoe came around the house and ran toward X.
“Is there any chance you can talk like a normal human being for even two minutes?” she said.
“I shall endeavor to do what the circumstances require,” he said.
Zoe rolled her eyes.
“We are so screwed,” she said.
Rufus came around the back of the house now, too, and saw them. He approached Jonah first, playfully baring his teeth and hissing like an animal.
“I am One Tooth, ancient ruler of the cat tribes of the tundra!” he exclaimed.
“And I am Many Teeth, the usurper!” Jonah shouted back.
The exchange cracked both of them up, and they ran to hug each other.
Watching, X was hit by a wave of jealousy—he hadn’t realized how attached he’d become to the little boy.
Zoe’s mother, meanwhile, looked alarmed.
“Perhaps all is not lost,” X told Zoe quietly. “I have spent years listening to Banger in his cell, and he died not so long ago. I believe I can do a tolerable imitation of him.”
“Then start now,” said Zoe.
Rufus came toward them. He was flushed with happiness. He extended his hand to X in greeting. Rufus was maybe five years younger than Zoe’s mom. He had a friendly, open face, an unruly, reddish-brown beard, and dark hair that clumped together in a strange way. He caught X staring at it, and smiled such a wide, unself-conscious smile that X’s jealousy turned a deeper shade.
“Yeah, I’m thinking about dreads,” Rufus said. “But I’m only thinking about them, so don’t judge me. Your hair’s pretty epic, too, bro. What’s your name? I’m Rufus.”
X took his hand.
Zoe and her mother stared at him, waiting. He had never even spoken his name aloud.
“’Sup, dude?” he said. “I’m X.”
seven
That night, after Zoe was safely launched into her dreams, X padded around the quiet house. He had lived such a barren life that the rush of faces and voices and attachments had unnerved him. He could not sleep. The lords would be strategizing even now about how best to punish him. He knew he should return to the Lowlands before they struck. And yet Zoe had all but silenced the Trembling. She had all but silenced everything. She had filled everything. When she had hugged him for just that instant on the lake…