Chapter 22
George

Riding bikes with Jack is great! At his house, Jack only has one bike so we always had to take turns, and that usually meant Jack took turns around and around and around the street, while I watched. This is a lot more fun.

The city is starting to wake up though, so I should probably decide where we’re going to hide until it’s time for lunch with his dad.

“Where are we going?” Jack asks from behind me, wondering the same thing I am.

A cluster of trees momentarily blocks out the rising sun. And an idea hits me. As if by magic. “Follow me, Jack!” I exclaim, taking a quick left at the corner. He doesn’t say anything, but I hear tires spinning on the pavement behind me, so I know he’s still following.

In about two minutes, we’re at the park. There’s nobody here right now, but soon the city will be hopping, and nobody will notice two extra kids in a crowd. It’s the perfect place to hang out while I figure out which barbecue place is Jack’s parents’ “usual.”

We drop our bikes near the entrance, and I point to our first stop, far across the green: the tree house. I told you I’d come back for you, I mentally comfort the flier that I accidentally littered in the tree more than a week ago.

“My dad’s up there?” Jack sounds less confident, but before I can correct him and explain, he’s scurrying up the ladder into the tree house. From above, I hear him shout, “Dad!”

Oh dear.

“DAD!” he calls out again, his head emerging through the window of the tree house as he scans the park. It’s useless since his dad’s not there.

“Mom?” he says, quieter this time. What have I done?

“Jack,” I call from below before clutching the first wooden plank on the tree trunk and taking a deep breath. One step at a time, I make my way up the tree with my eyes closed, too scared to look up or down or anywhere at all.

After what feels like forever, my hand reaches up and slaps the floor of the cabin. Thank goodness! I pull myself in. The daylight seems to have filled in since the last time my eyes were open all the way at the bottom of the tree.

The tree house is smaller than I thought it would be, but it’s amazing. Four wooden walls, a wooden floor, a slanted wooden roof, three windows, and a door. Scattered leaves and junk decorate the floor. Jack is sitting in the corner, his head resting in his knees, bopping up and down. He’s . . . crying?

“Jack?” I approach my best friend cautiously.

His words are so quiet I can barely hear them. “You said he would be here. Why would you lie to me? Again?”

“I didn’t say that!” I insist, holding both of my hands out in front of me and glancing at the steep drop behind me. “You misunderstood, Jack!”

He picks up a sheet of loose paper from the floor and crinkles it in his fists. I recognize it immediately as my poster. “Hey, Jack,” I exclaim, pointing to the paper. “It’s—”

“Blank,” he cuts me off, looking first at one side, and then the other. He tosses it aside.

But it’s not blank! With a punched-in-the-gut feeling, I take a step back. The ground beneath my feet is gone! I shriek as I realize I must have just backed out of the tree house door.

My eyes clench closed as my body begins to plummet. “Goodbye, my frie—”

SPLAT. My chest thunks against the wooden floor of the tree house. Huh?

My eyes pop wide open. Jack towers above me as he surges to his feet, but instead of taking my hand to save me from certain death, he points to my legs. When I realize I’ve only fallen about two feet instead of two hundred, I look down as well. In typical disappearing-act fashion, my legs are gone, jeans and all. My top half is resting on the floor, alone. No wonder I didn’t feel the floor beneath me.

I feel incomplete without my legs, and I blush.

“George?” Jack asks, clearly hoping for an explanation as he finally holds out his hand to help.

The moment I take his hand, my legs and pants return, raising me back to Jack’s height.

There’s no easy way to say it: “I’m disappearing, Jack.”

Tears threaten to flow from Jack’s eyes again.

“Don’t cry. I said I’d take you to your family, and I will. But your dad’s message said one o’clock, so I figured we could come here in the meantime.”

“It’s fine,” he says, as though he doesn’t even need his parents at this moment. I shouldn’t be so selfish, but a smile engulfs my face. It’s been so long since he’s put me first. “How long have you had the disappearing legs?”

“Since I left you, and it’s not always my legs. Arms, ears, spleen, whatever. They come and they go. You get used to it, I guess, but once all of me disappeared and I kind of think it wasn’t the first time.”

Jack’s mouth drops open. “This is all my fault.”

I shake my head vigorously. “No, no, no, Jack. Don’t say that. It might’ve even happened before I met you, too. I think that’s why I barely remember anything from before then. It’s why I’m looking for answers. It’s why I need you.”

He bites his lip. “George . . .” He sounds like he’s about to explain something important, but he doesn’t say anything else. I understand. What do you say to somebody who has a bad case of the disappearings?

I don’t like how sad he looks, so I change the subject. “Enough about me,” I insist. “Let’s talk about”—I slyly grin—“oh I don’t know. Your favorite barbecue places?”