Chapter Five

Back at school Tuesday morning, as I approached my locker, there were a few kids standing in front of it. They saw me, turned away, and walked quickly toward something else. Anything else. I forced myself to hold my head up, pretending not to care about them and to take no notice of the purple letters.

But then something snapped in me. Friday's paint job had been done on a whim, on the heels of feeling ashamed of what "my" people kept doing to Griffin and "his" people. And although I'd had a few difficult moments over the weekend, knowing there was going to be some kind of hell to pay this week, it no longer felt like a whim. It felt like the first step on a journey I needed to take. And it was my way of announcing that journey. Like, I'm gay. Get over it.

Half-way through home room, the office secretary appeared and handed something to the teacher, Mrs. Sawicki, who caught my eye and beckoned me to the front. I was pretty sure I knew this was going to be about my locker, and not knowing how long it would take I grabbed my book bag and followed the secretary back to the principal's office.

Mrs. Knapp sat behind her desk, looking busy, but she set everything aside as I took a chair facing the desk.

"Good morning, Jesse. It's been a while since you and I had a chance to talk."

"Yes, ma'am." I sat tall, head up, ready for anything.

"I'm sorry we have a difficult subject to discuss today. You are aware, I'm sure, of what someone has done to your locker."

Again, "Yes, ma'am." I was about to explain who "someone" was, but she didn't give me time.

"I can't tell you how much we disapprove of anything like that being inflicted on any of our students. I want you to know that steps will be taken immediately to remove the offensive term and restore the locker. In the meantime, I'm assigning you to a different locker."

That was about as far as she needed to go to get me really pissed. I'd been counting up responses point by point as she'd spoken.

"Mrs. Knapp, first of all, I was the one who painted the locker. Second, I don't want the word 'gay' removed, and I don't want a new locker. Third, there's nothing 'offensive' about being gay. And fourth, I'm surprised that you take this so seriously, when there are other lockers painted with truly offensive terms, and no one gets reassigned."

She sat back, her expression having gone through a few phases: surprise, confusion, and annoyance. "You do realize, Jesse, that painting a locker is considered to be vandalism, whether it's your own locker or not? So you've just confessed to vandalism."

I was sure she was going to say more, but the bell for first period rang and I took advantage of the break to prepare my next response. Struggling hard to keep my tone polite and calm, I said, "Okay, so you should probably give me the same punishment you've given to Lou and Chuck. They're always vandalizing Griffin Holyoke's locker. What action did you take against them? Just so I can be prepared."

She sucked her cheeks in, chewed on her lower lip, and stared at me. Then, "Since you've confessed, this concerns no one but you. So, first, all items from the vandalized locker have already been moved to a new locker. My secretary will give you the locker number and combination as you leave. Second, you are hereby required to stay after school in Mrs. Sawicki's class each day this week, for an hour each day. You will be expected to work on your school assignments during this time, and no cell phone use will be permitted. Third—since you seem to like things itemized—if you vandalize your new locker, the punishment will be stiffer. Do you understand?"

"You didn't address one of my points."

"And that would be—?"

"You implied that there's something offensive about being gay. And I'm gay, so I found that offensive. And maybe you're not aware of what was painted by Lou and Chuck on my locker before I redecorated it. It was the word 'faggot.' Now, that's offensive. But being gay is not."

"Young man, that part of your life is not something we will discuss. I'm sorry about what was painted on your locker by someone else, but if what you've told me is something you're convinced of, I suggest you would be well advised not to advertise it, on your locker or anywhere else."

"So my being gay is offensive to you? And you think I should hide it, because everyone else will agree with you?"

"What I think of this issue is irrelevant. I'm suggesting that if you go out of your way to advertise it, something worse than having your locker vandalized is very likely to happen. You've already said you believe that there are other students committing vandalism, although to be truthful I wasn't aware of it. Perhaps Griffin is removing the graffiti himself before it's reported. At any rate, you should keep your head down, young man, so that we don't have anything more serious than today's subject to discuss in the near future. Now, do you understand?"

"I understand what you've said. I've understood it very well, in fact." Without waiting to be dismissed, I got up, yanked my bag off the floor, and marched out. The secretary stopped me.

"Jesse, here's your new locker number and a hall pass. First period is already under way."

I snatched the piece of paper from her hand and nearly stomped out of the office. Rather than go to first period, I decided to find my new locker. I needed some time to cool off.

Keep my head down, she'd said. Interesting. Just yesterday I'd decided that was what I needed to do. Now it seemed like a bad idea. It seemed like a cowardly idea.

The new locker was missing a couple of items I'd left in the old one: the solvent, and the can of purple paint. Mrs. Knapp must not have known about them, or she would have known who the vandal was. I decided I'd wait a couple of days, see how I felt, and maybe go and get some more paint.

 

 

So maybe my plan was no longer "head down," but after today's episode with Mrs. Knapp I was not very pleasant to much of anyone, including Mom. Which translated into not spending any time in the kitchen voluntarily.

Mom must have got sick of my attitude, because Thursday after her four o'clock piano student left, she came to my room and interrupted my research for a history paper. My chosen topic was the usurping of Pagan traditions by Christianity. I was annoyed that she interrupted, not only because I didn't want her to confront me on anything, but also because this paper was for history, and there was a new teacher this year for that class. Mr. Duncan was around thirty, I guess, and he had a lot of really fresh ways of looking at history, ways that brought it into life like history had never done for me before. And I knew he'd be cool with my topic. He might even be really pleased with it. He might think it was original, one of his favorite words. But here was Mom, interrupting.

"Jesse, I think we need to talk."

Ominous. I sighed, shut my laptop, and leaned back in my chair, arms crossed on my chest. Mom moved over to the bed and sat down, and I had to turn my chair so I could face her; I was prepared to be only so rude. But I said nothing, just waited for her to begin.

She stared at me for a minute. Then, "I don't understand what's gotten into you lately." To which my brain responded, OMG. What a typical parent line, to which no teenager has any acceptable response.

She waited, but so did I, so she said, "You have nothing to say?"

I shrugged. "Don't know what to say. You'll need to be more specific."

She glared at me. "I have been nothing but friendly toward you. I'm doing my very best to accept what you've told us about yourself, and I think you know that. And yet you disappear for hours on end with no explanation, you're surly at the dinner table, and you're not available to help me do something I know you enjoy doing. Is that specific enough?"

"My father and brother have made it very clear to me that it makes them uncomfortable when I do things they consider unmanly. Dad practically attacked me about the cooking thing. How am I going to get them to accept me if I keep doing things they think a man shouldn't do?"

She opened her mouth to respond, but I kept going. "And as for disappearing, and not talking, how is that different from what they do? You don't quiz Stu when he's out for hours, and both he and Dad talk very little at any time. Dad wants me to be more like him. You want me to be—what, more like you?"

I hated myself as soon as I said that. I wanted desperately to take it back; there was no excuse for hurting my mother, and I knew damn well that's what I was doing. The look on her face confirmed it.

She stood, tears in her eyes, about to leave. Then something flew into my brain and my mouth let it out. "Do you wish you'd had a daughter instead of me?"

As she headed for the door she threw this at me: "Not until today, no."

I wasn't the only one who could hurt people.

 

 

Brad had asked, a couple of times that week at school, if something was wrong, but I'd shrugged him off, saying I was fine. For whatever reason, he never mentioned my locker. He must have known about it, though, because I kept seeing little bunches of kids break up and move away from me as I got closer to them. But by Friday afternoon I'd had about enough isolation, so when Brad asked if I'd go rockhounding with him Sunday after church, I agreed immediately. I was ready for some companionship. It felt unnatural to be so anti-social. I decided to apologize to Mom.

Then, a few minutes later, I got a text from Griffin inviting me to walk the finished labyrinth on the following Sunday, February first, and then stay for a grove supper and the Imbolc bonfire. It probably shouldn't have surprised me how much I wanted to go. I mean, it really isn't like me to lock out everyone in my life, to stop talking, stop being myself in ways that have nothing to do with being gay. Plus, I'd be with Griffin and his people. So I agreed.

Of course I got home a little late, what with my punishment from Mrs. Knapp over the locker vandalism, but at least some of my homework was already done. As Mom's last student left, I was waiting for her. She turned back toward the room after closing the front door and saw me standing there. Her tone cold, she said, "Did you need something, Jesse?"

Hands in my pockets, shifting weight from foot to foot, I said, "I want to apologize. For being so rude. And for saying the things I said."

Her chin went into the air a little way, but I could tell I'd said what she wanted to hear. "Anything else?"

"I miss working with you in the kitchen. So if it's okay with you, I'd like to do that again."

She was trying not to smile, but she failed. "I think that could be arranged."

"There's something else, though."

I needed to prepare the ground for going into the village, which I already had more plans to do, based on Griffin's invitation. Also, I knew that having her question where I'd been, when a full answer would have included things I didn't want her to know, would get me back to the place I'd been this week. It was a place I didn't like, a place that didn't feel like the real me. If being gay was the real me, so was being truthful, and being nice to my mom.

I took a deep breath. "The thing is, I need a little more latitude when I'm not at home. If I'm out for a few hours, I need you to trust me. I mean, trust that I'm not doing anything horrible, or illegal, or anything like that. Because I won't be. I just don't want to have to account for every minute, that's all."

She thought about that for a second. "We'll need to work that out, Jesse. You're still—"

"I'm seventeen."

"And you—" She raised a hand to her hairline.

I knew what she was thinking. "I don't have a boyfriend, Mom. And I'm not having 'gay sex' all over my truck or anyplace else."

She watched my face a minute, maybe to be sure she believed me. "That could change."

"Yeah, I guess it could."

She exhaled audibly. "As I said, we'll need to work it out."

Several things occurred to me, but rather than say any of them, I asked, "So, do you need any help with dinner?"

 

 

Sunday afternoon was great weather for rockhounding, chilly but not cold. The night before I'd lain in bed for a while thinking about Brad, and about lies. I'd told him about being gay before coming out to my folks. Maybe I would test him on going into the village, too.

Brad had only one pack with him. "I won't be able to do much until this cast comes off; still a couple of weeks to go. So if you find something you want to work at, you can use my stuff."

He told me to drive to the same place we'd been when he'd pointed out the bobcat cave, and then he said, "Are we gonna talk about this locker thing, or not?"

I laughed. "If you want, sure."

"What's so funny?"

"Look, I know I've been kind of a turd this week. But—well, I painted the locker."

There was a heavy pause. Then, "Dude."

I told him about the word that had been there Friday, though I didn't mention meeting with Griffin or what was on his locker. Brad couldn't quite believe the story of my conversation with Mrs. Knapp.

"Shit, man! How the hell did you get away with that?"

"It seemed like a good idea at the time."

"And now?"

I laughed again. "It still seems like a good idea." I could feel him staring at the side of my face. "And I might just paint my new locker the same way."

"So I guess you're out for real, now. Who else knows you painted it?"

"Just Mrs. Knapp, as far as I know."

Neither of us knew what else to say about that, but the feeling I was getting from Brad was that maybe he wasn't entirely cool with my artwork. Maybe it was something about the way he grabbed the pack, broken arm notwithstanding, rather than let me carry it.

It had snowed a little since I'd hauled that limestone slab out, but when we got to where it had been, you could tell something had been removed. Brad stopped beside the spot and turned to me.

"Isn't this where that stone was? The limestone with the quartz breccia you found last time we were here?"

"Yeah. About that. I took it."

"You what?"

I inhaled deeply and looked around at the trees and the rocky ridge on my right for inspiration, or courage, or something. Then I looked at Brad again. "I took it. You'd said you didn't think it was quite worth the effort, at least for why you collect rocks. But I knew of someone else who could use it, so I hauled it out and gave it to them."

He stared at me, right hand on his hip, a scowl on his face. "You're gonna have to explain that."

I grinned. "Yeah, I know. See, this is something I've been meaning to talk with you about. There just hasn't been a great time. But—well, the thing is, I've been helping the people in the village build a labyrinth." I almost said "grove" here but caught myself in time. "It's in Mr. Ward's memory. The guy who tried to protect Mary Blaisdell?" I paused to see if I could get a read on Brad's reaction so far.

He was still scowling, but maybe more in confusion than anything else. "Why would you do that?" He sounded almost like Mom when she'd asked why I'd driven to the grove the day after Mr. Ward was killed.

I shrugged, hoping to lighten things a little, just in case this was going in a bad direction. "I felt really bad about him getting killed, and it irritated me that nobody seemed to think he'd done something good. Or, at least, tried to. I mean, if my dad had been in his place and had gotten killed, he'd have died a hero. But Mr. Ward gets hung in effigy, and his family got pestered by the police as though he'd been after Mary, himself. And every time I mention the situation, everyone acts like it isn't something he should have done. Protect Mary, I mean."

The scowl deepened. Like he knew this conversation would take a few minutes, he lowered the pack to the ground. "How do you know how the police treated the Wards?"

"Griffin told me."

"Griffin Holyoke? Since when do you talk to Griffin Holyoke?"

I felt my own scowl start; couldn't quite stop it. "Why shouldn't I talk to him? He's in our classes, for fuck's sake."

The air between us felt thick with some kind of tension, some of it left over from the locker discussion, and some from this new difference between us. Neither of us moved or spoke for maybe half a minute. Brad must have decided to avoid working through it. He went around it. "And what's this about a maze?"

"Not a maze, a labyrinth. Mazes try to get you lost. Labyrinths lead you into the center and out again."

"Why?"

I waved a hand. "I can go into that later. Right now what I need to tell you is that I've been helping them build one. And this stone," I pointed to where it wasn't any longer, "is at the very center. It's where you end up when you walk in, and where you leave from when you walk out. And I need to ask you not to say anything to anyone about my having anything to do with the village, because I'll be going there again. And I'm not supposed to. Will you do that? Will you promise?"

His scowl let up a little; I hoped he was remembering that I was keeping a promise for him already. about his dad. Finally he shrugged and his face relaxed. "Who would I tell, anyway?"

"Staci. Your sisters. Maybe someone at school. Your mom."

"I got it, okay? But I can't say I understand."

I really wanted him to. "Here's the thing. I really like being there. I liked working on the labyrinth. I like the people, I like the way they approach things. They couldn't care less if someone's gay. They've done the dedication of the labyrinth for Mr. Ward—I wasn't there, it was on a Tuesday night—but there's a holiday coming up for their… um, tradition," I wasn't quite sure I'd call it a religion, and I made a mental note to ask Griffin about that, "when they'll walk the labyrinth and have supper and a bonfire. I've been invited to be there. It's next Sunday. I really want to go. But just a few weeks ago, Mom told me to stay away from the village."

"So you're asking me to say you're with me next Sunday?"

"Well..." That hadn't occurred to me, actually, because I'd been so focused on having enough freedom that I wouldn't need a cover. And almost immediately I saw that it would involve another lie, one I'd be dragging Brad into. "No. That's not why I'm telling you. I'm telling you because you're my best friend, and because I want you to know about something that's important to me."

He stood there, scratching near the edges of the cast on his left arm, looking around at nothing in particular. Then, "This is a lot, Jesse. First, I find out you're gay, and that you've known for a long time. I'm not saying it's a problem, just that it was a bit of a surprise, and I'm still adjusting. And now, out of the blue, you're chumming around with the freaks? That, I don't get."

"Don't call them that. They're people. And they—well, they have no problem at all with anyone being different."

"Yeah, well, they're all a little 'different,' aren't they?"

"Knock it off, Brad. They're just people. I'm the one who's different. And like I said before, they couldn't care less." I watched his face, hoping I'd see something like understanding, but I didn't. I thought about describing this mission I'm on—this mission to dissolve the fear that townies have for the village—with love. But best friend no, Brad was still Brad, and I didn't think he'd know what to do with that information. So instead I fell back on the gay thing.

"Look, maybe you don't get how tough it's been for me. I've been hiding for over two years, terrified of giving away something about me I couldn't change, something that everyone around me would think was horrible. Hell, even I've had moments when I've felt ashamed of who I am. And that's bullshit. The people in the village know it's bullshit. Your reaction was great. It made me feel worlds better. But you never even asked how my folks reacted."

"Wait. You told your folks? I thought you decided not to."

"I decided not to open with all that research you saw. I opened with love. It didn't make much difference. I could have opened with anything, and Stu would still hate me, Dad would still be ashamed of me, and Mom would still be watching me like a hawk, afraid I'm dating boys. And now the same assholes who paint Griffin's locker are painting mine, and our own principal practically told me to be ashamed of who I am. So I hope you see how—God, how free I feel with Griffin and his people. So fucking free. So fucking great."

This was so true and so real that I was near tears, and I think Brad saw that. I turned away so he couldn't see my face, my breathing a little tight. I barely heard him speak.

"Jesse, it's okay. I'll keep both your secrets."

Without turning back, I gave a tiny nod, afraid of what would happen if I tried to say Thanks. We stood there like that for some huge number of seconds.

Then, obviously trying to make his voice sound normal, he said, "So this labyrinth thing. Am I going to get to see it?" This time it didn't feel like he was avoiding tension. It felt like that was behind us, and he was just moving on to the next thing.

I let out a sound that was half laugh, half bark. "I'll see if I can get you safe passage."

"Great. So why are we still standing here? Let's get chiseling." He handed me the pack and led the way along the trail to the far side of the outcropping..

It was amazing to watch Brad work his way up the rock face. It wasn't straight up, or anything, but he had only the one hand to work with, and it was a scramble. Before too long he stood up straight on a flat outcropping and waited for me to catch up. In front of him was a cave.

"Gimme the pack." His voice was very quiet. He pulled out a cylinder of some kind, turned the head a quarter of a revolution, and handed the thing to me. "Stand over there," and he pointed toward where the rock face made a kind of wall off to the right side of the cave. "If something comes out and doesn't run away from us, stand tall and get ready to spray it with pepper spray. If it comes near either of us, you need to spray it."

WTF?

He picked up some rocks, cradling them against his chest with the cast, and threw one into the cave. He was poised like anything could happen, but nothing did. He threw another rock, and another. He moved closer and threw a couple more.

"K. Looks good."

While he dug a helmet, goggles, a headlamp, and a chisel from his pack, I asked, "So, what might have come out? Are we talking bobcats again? Or bears?"

"Cougars. They're mostly in the western part of the state, but there've been a few sightings farther east, and even into Arkansas."

Cougars. Mountain lions. He was gonna owe me big time after this! Bobcats avoid people whenever possible. Cougars eat them.

I struggled to keep my voice calm. "So, I'm guessing my job is to stand guard and watch for returning cats?"

"Yup. If you see something, start shouting. I'll get out as quick as I can. The rest will be obvious. Meanwhile, if you have a few songs at your command, or if you know a poem, it would be good to keep some sound going." He crouched down as well as he could, hampered by his cast, and crawled into the cave. It didn't seem to be very deep; I could still see his boots when a light inside told me he'd switched on his headlamp.

I pulled my phone out, turned the volume up to maximum, and set it to repeat a tune that had a lot of noise to it. Then I found a good lookout position. "Can you hear me in there?"

"Yeah."

"So besides my phone, I think what I'll do for sound is talk to you about the village." While he chipped away at rocky bits in the cave, I kept up a running stream of chatter, telling him about the time I'd driven out after Mr. Ward was killed, about the Samhain celebration (though I called it Halloween for Brad's sake), about the beauty of the funeral in the woods, about the other stones I'd collected for the labyrinth, about the great food at the worksite that day, and about blacksmith and all-around superman, Todd Swazey. I didn't mention Ronan or anything he'd told me about dousing, or energy, or cold moons. I almost—but not quite—forgot to look around for cats.

When Brad scrambled out of the cave again, he was pulling a chamois cloth with rocks and stones on it, his haul from the chipping efforts. As he packed everything back up again, I asked, "Get anything good?"

"Naw. Couldn't really maneuver in there with this cast. Besides, I'd pretty much worked it dry before today. You can go in if you want, but I doubt you'll find anything worth keeping."

"Okay, so why come here?"

He sat on the stone ledge, legs out straight, the chamois between his knees. He was folding it up, awkwardly, and didn't look at me. "Actually, I thought you’d get a kick out of this spot. I love it. And anyway, I'm saving this paltry collection. Maybe someday I'll want to show it to my dad. Tell him this is all I could get with the broken arm he gave me."

Dark. And it was the only time he'd mentioned his dad without me prodding him. His tone told me he didn't want to discuss it even now. I went in a different direction. "So how likely was it, really, that there would have been a cougar here?"

"Not very. I did look for scat around the bottom of the ledge, and scratch marks as we came up, and all around the cave entrance. It was very unlikely. But with cougars, you need to be real careful."

"Have you ever actually seen one?"

"Nope. And I hope that doesn't change."

Oddly, I felt myself kind of hoping I would see one sometime, but from a safe distance.

Brad sat on the ledge, his back to the rock wall, and pulled out an insulated bag. "I packed us a snack. You hungry?"

"Great! Yeah."

He handed me a plastic bottle. "Here's water for you."

I moved over to sit beside him as we downed peanut butter sandwiches and apples. I couldn't help wondering if he'd brought something to feed us in compensation for dragging me someplace I wouldn't find any good rocks.

Food gone, we were sipping our water, and Brad said, "So this labyrinth thing. Tell me again. What's the point?"

"You're supposed to contemplate something important in your life as you walk it. Other things occur to you on your way in, and you just keep moving your thoughts back to what you wanted to think about. When you get to the center, you see how everything in your head is stacking up, kind of. And when you're ready, you walk out again and see if something else comes to you, like what to do about a problem, that sort of thing."

He stared out at the branches of trees. We were about half-way up some of them, close to the tops for others. Lots of pines in the mix meant there was a lot of green.

"So here's the thing," he said, finally. "I know I owe you, so I'm gonna keep your secret, like I said earlier. And," he took a final swig of water and crushed the plastic bottle in his hand, "I wanna see this labyrinth. Doesn't need to be on this holiday thingy, whatever that is. Could be a couple of weeks, whatever. I wanna see how they used that rock, and I wanna meet these people you're getting to know." He looked at me. "Deal?"

It's hard to describe the relief I felt after he said that. The only thing was whether I really could get him in to see the labyrinth. It isn't exactly up to me. Griffin and Ronan had both led me to believe they'd welcome an approach in good faith, but did Brad have reasons other than what he'd said? Was he prepared to change his mind about the people he'd been taught to fear, or at least to ridicule?

"I just need to ask you first if you're genuinely interested in the village. Because," he started to protest and I had to talk over him, "the thing is, they're so used to folks from the town kind of spying on them, or making fun of what they do, kind of like they're some kind of circus act, and that really makes them crazy. I don't blame them. They've opened things up to me because they know I don't go talking about them, and because I take what they do seriously. Doesn't mean I'm ready to join them, or anything, but I'm trying to understand them. Do you know what I mean?"

"What d'you take me for?"

"I just need to be sure you understand that they're skittish about opening themselves up to—you know, ridicule, gossip. Look, even today, when I mentioned Griffin, you wanted to know why I would talk to him. Remember?"

He shrugged, looking a little sheepish. "Yeah. Okay. I get it. I'll play nice."

I grinned at him until he looked at me and grinned back. "I just need to clear it with them, but I'm pretty sure it won't be a problem."

We'd finished all the food, our water was gone, but I wasn't ready to leave, and it seemed Brad wasn't, either. He lay back, and I sat near the edge of the ledge, legs hanging over. The rock was warm where the sun had been shining on it.

After a few minutes I heard Brad snore once or twice, just a little. Maybe he woke himself up, because he sat up, yawned, and rubbed his face with his right hand. That's when I decided to take a small risk.

"So, things with your dad. Are they getting any better at all?"

Brad took a little time to pretend he was looking around, maybe for cougars or something, before he said, "He has this meeting every week with Reverend Gilman."

"I remember you'd mentioned something about that, the day we watched Gravity." I waited; silence. "The meetings are helping, then?"

No response right away, but I was determined to wait him out. Finally, grudgingly, he said, "I think so. I'm just not ready to forgive him."

"Yeah, well, I don't blame you for that." I didn't see any point in pushing him further. It was enough to know Brad's mom and sisters—and Brad, too, for that matter—weren't likely to be in any immediate danger of being zapped. And it was starting to feel like we needed to lighten things up.

Brad must have thought the same. "By the way, how the hell did you get that limestone slab out all by yourself?"

I grinned, remembering my struggle, and described my process. "The toughest part was that slope back up to the truck."

He laughed, and I couldn't remember the last time he'd laughed with humor. His antics after we'd watched Gravity didn't count. He said, "Well, shit. I'm impressed."

 

 

Griffin was not altogether happy about my request for Brad to see the labyrinth, however. I asked him about it after school Monday, at our trysting spot in the cafeteria.

"Jesse, does he even know what a labyrinth is?"

"I explained it to him. See, the thing that caught his attention was that rock, the one you've put in the center. He goes rock hunting out near where it came from. He knows a lot about rocks. Not like Ronan, I mean, but—you know. What kind of rock it is, that sort of thing. He has a huge collection, and most of them are specimens he's found himself. And, actually, you kind of owe him; the only reason I knew about that rock was because we went hunting together."

"So he knows rocks from a geological point of view."

"Yeah, I guess."

"And how open is he to hearing about them from more of an energetic viewpoint?"

"You mean, like Eleanor and Ronan see them? I'm not sure. But if you don't want to go into that aspect with him, that's okay. I don’t think he’d be there more than a few minutes, anyway." I was kind of hoping no one would describe rock energies, to tell the truth; I didn't know how Brad would respond to Ronan's description of that dousing stone, for example, or about the less scientific qualities of white quartz.

"Well, I'll need to talk to Eleanor. I'll have to let you know."

"Is Eleanor, like, the lead person in the grove, or something?"

"Yes."

"Is she married?"

"Widowed. Why do you ask?"

I shrugged. "Just wondering if there's a king of the grove, if she's queen, or whatever."

"She's the Elder. And not just because her husband died several years ago; he never had that role. And it has only a little to do with her age." He exhaled loudly. "Okay, well, if you don't hear otherwise, let's assume it'll be fine. So on Sunday, people will be walking the labyrinth on and off all afternoon, and then we'll all be involved in dinner prep. Why don't you come by sometime after three?"