Game

“Sure, that makes sense. But walk how far? His age? Seventeen steps?” Without waiting for an answer, Howie immediately loped off to the east, counting out until he hit seventeen.

Shaking her head, Co

“Whatever was buried was buried a long time ago, I bet.”

“Why do you say that?”

Co

Cha

“Look,” she said, speaking rapidly, before the idea could flit out of her mind as quickly as it had flown in, like a bug sucked into and out of an open car window. “We don’t know for sure who’s leading us on this wild-goose chase, but odds are it’s Billy or someone co

Howie nodded. “Yeah. All right, that tracks.” He stomped the ground with his huge foot. “And, yeah, if anything’s buried here, it had to be long enough ago that all the ground settled.”

Glancing back at the cherry tree—seventeen Howie-steps to the west—Co

“Jazz is seventeen,” Howie protested. “I took seventeen steps—”

“Right. But first of all, we’re assuming seventeen is the right number. Think about it—if whatever it was was buried a long time ago, there’s no way the burier could know when we would come looking for it. Unless whoever it is specifically pla

“—because what if something made it so that this ‘game’ had to be triggered earlier?” Howie finished. “I get it. So maybe it’s Jazz’s age when the thing was buried?” Howie groaned. “How are we supposed to know that?” He turned away from her, morose.

“Come on, Howie. Don’t punk out on me. Whoever’s doing this wants us to play the game. We can figure this out.” She hoped. What if this wasn’t a game, but a joke? What if this was a setup, designed to get Jazz’s girlfriend and best friend out here where something could—

“The cherry tree…” Howie spun around. “We were eleven!”

Before Co

“This is it! Eleven steps away from the tree! This is the spot!” He stomped hard, then winced. “Oh, man, that’s go

He was so happy that it broke Co

“But we were eleven when we wanted to build the tree house. That’s why Billy or whoever chose the cherry tree as the starting—”

“Yeah, and I believe that you’re right that eleven is the answer to the ‘Jasper’ clue. But eleven what?”

“Eleven steps,” Howie said, frustrated. “It’s always ‘take three paces this way and ten paces that way.’ Jesus, Co

“But whose steps, Howie? Billy’s? Jazz’s? Yours? Look at your NBA-length legs, man.” Howie looked down. “When I walk next to you, I have to take, like, a step and a half for every step you take.”

Howie blew out an a

“I bet he’d choose something simple to remember. I bet it’s just feet. Not, like, his feet. Real feet. Twelve inches.”

“Then we’re in luck,” Howie said, and rushed back to the tree. By the time Co

“And you know this because…?”

“Because you know what they say about guys with big feet.” He waggled his eyebrows. “Anyway, this should get us close, right?”

“Yeah.”

Howie counted eleven. “Okay. Then this should do it. Bring me that stick.”

Casting about in the dark, Co

“This—uh—marks the spot—uh—or at least within a few inches—uh—so we can come back with a shovel—uh—damn it!” He wiped cold sweat from his forehead.

Co

“I was about to try that,” Howie explained.

“Right.”

“You grabbed it from me before I could.”

“Right.”

“You’ll never know!” he called after her, following her back to the car now. “I was just about to try that!”

“Sure.” But she wasn’t paying attention anymore. She was thinking of coming back with a shovel, when it was light out. When the ground would be a little warmer and less solid in the light of the sun. Thinking of digging.

Wondering what she might find.

Howie pulled a reversal of his clandestine extraction, drifting headlightless and engineless down the gentle slope toward her house.

“You’ll call me tomorrow, right?” he asked, and yawned.

“I’m about to jump out of a moving car and you’re yawning.”

“We’re going, like, a mile an hour.” He checked the speedometer, squinting. “Maybe a mile and a half.”

“I’ll call,” she said, and hopped out, jogging alongside the car until she had the door closed.

She felt very conspicuous, standing literally in the middle of the street. Howie had dropped her off (“inserted,” he insisted on saying, demanding they use spy lingo) three houses up from her own, just in case someone was awake and looking out the window in the Hall home. She moved to the side of the road and approached her house carefully. With the exception of the light near the front door, it was dark. And quiet.

She had a feeling, again, that someone was watching her. Not her dad or her mom. Not even Whiz. No, she had a sudden, foolish feeling that Billy was out there. Which was ridiculous, because the odds seemed to be that Billy was in New York. And even if he wasn’t, he wasn’t stupid enough to hang around Lobo’s Nod, the one place on the planet where almost every person would recognize him on sight.

But maybe he has magical powers and he can be in two places at once or can see across vast distances….

She shook herself and came just short of slapping her own cheek. She was exhausted. Thinking stupid things. Childish things.

As Howie had promised, her lubricated window opened easily and silently. With a small, nearly inaudible “Oof,” she hauled herself over the sill and into the quiet familiarity of her own bedroom. With the window closed, the room went warm and still. She enjoyed it for a moment.

If this had been a horror movie, she knew, there would be something here. Like, a clue. A note from the person who’d texted her, maybe.

Or a severed head. Or maybe a finger from the Impressionist. Or maybe…