She named him herself, so it felt like he belonged to her.
He said that where he was from, which he called the Lowlands, they strip your name away like a husk the moment you arrive—to remind you that you’re no one and nothing. When he told her this, she moved a little closer. She should have been scared after what she’d seen him do to Stan, but she wasn’t. Stan deserved everything he got and worse.
The lake was frozen, and they were standing way out in the middle. The ice was shifting, settling. It made booming sounds beneath them, as if it might give way. Stan was gone, but drops of his blood had seeped into the lake. There was a dark constellation at their feet.
She refused to look at it. She suggested some names, and he listened in silence, his eyes shy and wounded-looking. She wanted to step even closer, but she was afraid she’d startle him. She teased him instead.
She told him he seemed like either an Aragorn—or a Fred. He tilted his head, confused. She’d have to work on his sense of humor.
Otherwise, there was nothing about him she’d have changed. He had tangled black hair that fell near his eyes like vines. His face was pale, except for bruises high up on both cheeks. It looked like someone had grabbed his face and dug their fingernails in. Over and over. For years. She didn’t ask who had been hurting him—or why he’d been sent to whatever the Lowlands were in the first place. It was too soon for questions like that.
He told her that even if she gave him a name, the lords of the Lowlands wouldn’t let him use it. She’d heard him shout so fiercely at Stan. But with her, he was quiet and unsure. He said he didn’t think he even deserved a name after all the things he’d done. Been forced to do.
If that didn’t break her heart, it definitely tore a little bit off.
He was staring at her now—looking into her, like he thought she was the answer to something.
She gave him a playful look.
“Dude, seriously,” she said, “enough with the eyes.”
She told him everybody deserved a name—and that “the lords” should shut up.
She said hers was Zoe Bissell.
He nodded. He already knew. She couldn’t figure out how.
She told him she’d call him X until she knew what sort of person he was. X for an unknown variable. Zoe was 17, and so many crappy, lonely things had already happened to her that she knew it was insane to get close to even one more person. But maybe X’s pain, whatever it was, would help her put aside her own.
She told him that if the Lowlands took this name away, she’d just give him another one.
“Such as Fred,” he said, and attempted a smile.
He was learning.