“Well, my father’s hopefully in the hospital,” I say. “He got run over by a car. So he shouldn’t be after me again for a while. Right?”
Rachel looks at me, her brow furrowed. “I want to keep you safe,” she says. “Let me help you.”
“I don’t want to go stay in a yurt,” I say.
“Okay,” she says. “How about the farmhouse? The abandoned farmhouse, where we took the pictures? We can stay there for a bit and find out what happened with your father. But if he’s okay and can get back in a car and come after us, he won’t know where we are. And that’s not somewhere he’ll look.”
I think this over. Now that my fear has ebbed, my whole body feels heavy and I’m having trouble thinking straight. But she’s right; New Coburg isn’t safe. My father could probably find Rachel’s house—he has her license plate number, and the police around here are as likely to help him as the police in Marshfield were. They could probably help him find my apartment, too.
The farmhouse will be cold, and dark, and there won’t be anything to eat …
“Take me back to my apartment first,” I say. “We can pack up the food in the fridge.”
My mother’s apartment doesn’t look like it’s been touched. I refill the cat’s water dish and give her a bunch of cat food. Despite the open window, my bed is still dry, so I strip off all the sheets and blankets, then my mother’s sheets and blankets, and stuff them into the big nylon bag we use for this stuff when we move. We can bring it along to the house. It’ll be better than nothing.
The cooler is under the sink, and I fill it with the ice in the freezer and all the food in the fridge.
“I think someone’s out there,” Rachel says. She’s in my bedroom, around front.
I freeze. “Is it my dad?”
“It’s not the same car,” Rachel says. “I’m pretty sure it’s not your father, actually. I’m not sure who it is, though.”
“We could climb out the back window,” I say.
“That really wouldn’t be my first choice,” Rachel says. “Anyway, my car’s parked in front. Oh, he’s leaving. Okay. Let’s hurry.”
We hustle everything downstairs in one trip and get into the car. Rachel’s phone chimes, and she checks it and then looks at me with alarm. “Mom says someone was at the house, asking about you. A stranger.”
“Was it—”
“It doesn’t sound like it was your father.”
“Okay, but it might be someone working with him.”
“Let’s go,” Rachel says, and she drives out of town.
The abandoned farmhouse has an even-more-falling-down outbuilding and a bunch of overgrown bushes, which give Rachel a place to park her car where it’s not visible from the road. It’s a cold day, and it’s getting dark. We bring in all the blankets; I’d left most of my clothes in Rachel’s car, so we add some layers.
“Bring in your laptop,” Rachel says. “I want you to get on CatNet.”
“This house doesn’t even have electricity and you think it’s got Wi-Fi?”
“No, of course not, but my cell phone can turn into a hot spot.”
We set up in the old living room: layers of blankets on the floor under us, more layers on top of us. Everything is going to smell like mouse poop in the morning. At least the floor seems solid and there’s an interior wall we can lean our backs against. Rachel has a flashlight and her cell phone and I have a laptop, and that’s it for light. I also have no way to recharge the laptop without running it out to the car and turning the car on. It’ll be good for a couple of hours, though. I turn down the screen brightness to save battery power while Rachel sets up her phone.
“OMG OMG OMG,” Firestar greets me as I log on. I change my screen name to “LBB & Georgia” so people know she’s here, too. “OMG, WHAT HAPPENED? We got a summary from Orlando but it made no sense. WHAT HAPPENED?”
“Orlando?”
“The new person!!!! Xie said xie goes to your school?”
Rachel snickers and whispers, “Bryony,” under her breath.
I fill everyone in on what I know about what happened, which is more or less the same as Bryony knows. CheshireCat isn’t in the Clowder, so I send them a message. You were driving that car, right?
No response.
You really are the greatest hacker that ever lived, I try. Still nothing.
Ico, Hermione, Marvin, and Firestar are all on. “When was CheshireCat here last?”
“They logged out about an hour and a half ago,” Hermione says. “Right in the middle of the excitement. No explanations, they just poofed. Could be their parents? Or technical difficulties? I mean, my internet went out one time and Marvin thought maybe I was dead. Remember that, Marvin?”
“There had been a disaster in Portland,” Marvin says. “It was not unreasonable for me to be concerned.”
“It was a storm! Which is why my internet was out! The person who died was a forty-year-old woman!”
“Look, just because you say you’re a teenager doesn’t mean you actually are a teenager.”
“Yeah,” Firestar says. “But if everything she said about her life ever was a lie, would you even care if she died? Because it wouldn’t be your friend—your friend never existed. It would be a stranger you didn’t know. Random strangers die every day.”
I know for a fact that CheshireCat’s problems are not parental, and I don’t even know what it would mean for their internet access to go out.
Rachel runs back out for the cooler. We have deli meat and cheese, and a jar of pickles and a head of lettuce, but no bread. We eat slices of roast beef and cheddar. There’s a half gallon of milk, too, but I didn’t bring cups, so we swig out of the jug.
“This is so much more wholesome than Bryony’s party,” Rachel says.
“Beer? Weed?”
“No, there was this enormous bottle
