freedom he suspected he had never felt in his previous life. He had few expectations, and fewer fears, and whenever he felt anxious it passed quickly like a summer storm cloud, too small to give rain.
All in all, it was good being the Chocolate Ogre, although he didn’t feel much like an Ogre. Ogres have a bad temper, they ruin things, they chase people. Ogre was the wrong word. He felt more like a Chocolate Bunny. He told Mikey that, and Mikey instructed him never to say that again. “Bunnies are timid and fearful, and stupid,” Mikey had said. “You’re none of those things.”
“Yes, I am,” Nick had insisted. “I’m stupid!”
“No, you’re not,” Mikey had told him. “You’re just not yourself. That doesn’t make you stupid, it just makes you… muddled.”
It only served to confuse him, because if he wasn’t himself, then who was he?
Nick, Nick, Nick, Nick.
He ran from the cage and the farmhouse and the crazy scarred man, happily reciting the three things he knew that he knew. He kept to the train tracks as Mikey had said. They were easy to follow because the tracks had crossed into Everlost.
Allie, Allie, Allie, Allie.
He was content to live in the moment, but he sensed a certain sadness deep within himself. A longing for all the things he had once been, whatever those things were. He knew he had once been very clever. He had led hundreds of Afterlights, and, in fact the train he was following had once belonged to him. Mikey had said so.
Mikey, Mikey, Mikey, Mikey.
While he couldn’t grasp the memory of these things, he knew that who he had once been, was not gone completely. The memories were still out there, divided among the people he knew and loved. Seeing Mikey had brought some of those memories back to him.
Allie, Allie, Allie, Allie.
And seeing Allie would bring back even more. Only in gathering those memories, could he gather back all the pieces of the boy called Nick.
Mary, Mary, Mary, Mary.
The name stopped him in mid-stride. It had come out of nowhere-and he knew that nowhere often spat forth some very important things. A feeling came over him then, warm enough to melt him inside, but cold enough to harden him solid. It was joy poured hot into chilly foreboding. The feelings blended until he couldn’t tell one from another-and when he looked at his hands, he could, for the first time, see something resembling fingernails.
Nick, Mary, Nick, Mary, Nick, Mary.
He felt a fluttering inside his chest that he mistook for an air pocket-probably left from when he pushed himself through the cage. He had no way of knowing that the fluttering was a single beat from the fleeting memory of a heart.
CHAPTER 12
Universal Justice
M ikey told Clarence everything he knew. The crossing of himself and Mary into Everlost, his many years at the center of the earth, and the many years it took to get out. He told Clarence of his time on the ghost ship, and how he was the McGill, the most feared monster of Everlost. Mikey told him about Allie, and although he tried to hide how deep his feelings for her were, Clarence saw right through it.
“‘Love is the finest and foulest thing in the world. It will drive a man to greatness even while driving him into despair.’” Clarence proclaimed. “To quote the famous philosopher…”
“Which famous philosopher?” asked Mikey.
“If I knew, I would have told you.”
Mikey knew both the fine and foul sides of love. It was his love of Allie that had lifted him up from darkness; letting him see a better way than the way of the monster. But once that love took hold, it also left a fear in him, which always lingered in the back of his mind, and made him intensely jealous. It was the fear of losing her.
“Love turns a heart to crystal,” said Mikey. “Much more valuable, but much more fragile.”
Clarence put down his bottle. “Who said that?”
“I did,” said Mikey. “Just now.”
Clarence raised his Everlost eyebrow. “You oughta be a poet.”
Mikey was very pleased with himself. It had been a long time since anyone complimented him on anything he said or did.
“How’s this?” Clarence said, and then he held up his Everlost hand, moving it before him as if the words were written in the air. “The face that launched a thousand ships… never heard of hurricane season.”
Clarence laughed so hard it made Mikey laugh too. They were still laughing when the policemen came across the weedy field toward them-or more accurately toward Clarence, since they couldn’t see Mikey, or the cage that held him.
“Looks like you’re having quite a party,” the bigger of the two men said. “Wish I could be in there with you.” Then the two smirked to each other.
Mikey’s first thought was that they had been skinjacked, until he realized that “in there with you” meant in Clarence’s head. They took him for a lunatic talking to himself.
“I’m sorry but this here is private property,” said the larger officer, clearly the leader of the two. “We’re going to have to ask you to leave.”
“You’re renting!” shouted Mikey. “Tell them you’re renting this place. They won’t be able to kick you out until they check.”
“You shut up!” shouted Clarence. “I don’t need a freak like you telling me what to do!”
It was the wrong thing to say, because the officer thought that Clarence was talking to him. The man calmly reached his hand down to the hilt of his baton, and the other officer unsnapped the strap on his holster. “Now, none of us wants an incident,” said the lead officer. “We could arrest you for trespassing, but it would be easier for everyone if you just moved on. You understand?”
“I’m renting,” said Clarence. “Four hundred bucks a month. Check it out with my landlord if you don’t believe me.”
The officers looked to each other, then back at the dilapidated farmhouse, which, from their point of view probably wouldn’t be worth four dollars a month, much less four hundred.
Clarence glanced at Mikey, more resentful than thankful, then took a couple of steps toward the officers, staggering as he went. Mikey figured Clarence was drunk most of the time Mikey had been in the cage-but he’d never seen Clarence stumbling drunk.
“Go on-get out of here, and maybe I’ll pretend this harassment never happened.”
“Tell you what,” said the lead officer. “Come with us, we’ll check out your story, and if it’s true, we will bring you back here, no harm no foul.”
“I got rights,” Clarence said, “and I believe you are violating them right now.”
“That’s why you’re coming with us voluntarily,” said the second cop, speaking up for the first time.
The lead cop agreed. “Easier for everyone that way.”
If Clarence was taken away, Mikey knew he would be stuck here. The thought of rotting in a cage until someone found him and freed him was more than he could bear.
“Throw me the key to the padlock!” said Mikey.
“No way I’m doing that!”
“Pardon me?” said the lead officer.
“Throw me the key!” said Mikey. “And I’ll help you. I won’t run away, I promise!”
“How do I know I can trust you?” said Clarence.
“Trust us?” said the second officer. “Since you are the one allegedly trespassing, I don’t think you have much of a choice.”
“Throw me the key!”
