As he climbed through her window, she moved back, her eyes big as though she was seeing the world for the first time. “I’m glad you came back.”
“Me too,” Gabriel said, suddenly unsure about what to say to her. “Is your grandfather home?”
Hannah nodded. “But he rarely comes up here.” Her eyes turned to the door. “But it would be good if we didn’t speak too loudly.”
“Okay,” Gabriel said, keeping his voice down. His hair fell in his face as he lowered his head and shifted his eyes to the floor. Then he raised them to her face again. “I’m not sure what to say.”
She smiled. “Me neither. It’s been so long since I talked to someone my age. I’m always around adults.”
Gabriel glanced at the easel by the window where another painting of the meadow outside the house was in the making. “Do you really never go outside?”
Hannah shook her head.
“Why?”
For a moment, she avoided looking at him. “It’s difficult to…” She shrugged. “They say I shouldn’t.”
Gabriel didn’t understand, but she was clearly uncomfortable talking about it, and so he decided to drop the subject for now. “Are you an artist?” he asked, pointing at the canvas.
“Maybe I could’ve been,” she said. “In another life.”
Again, he wasn’t sure what she was saying. “And you read a lot. The living room at my grandparents’ house is stashed with books, too. My grandpa loves going on adventures as he calls it.”
“Yes,” she said, looking at her books almost lovingly. “All the places and people. I wouldn’t know what to do without them.”
“You paint, and you read,” Gabriel said, holding on to his courage to look her in the eyes. “Things you can only do by yourself. Don’t you want to see other people?” The moment he asked the question he already knew its answer. However, he didn’t know how else to ask.
Eyes wide, Hannah shook her head. “No, I wish I could go outside and…do all the things you do. I heard the music from the parade on the Fourth of July, and I saw the light from the bonfire, and I so wished I…I so wished I could go.” She swallowed. “Your life must be so exciting.”
Gabriel grinned. “I never thought of it like that before I got here. I was alone a lot, too.” He shrugged. “I even thought it was what I wanted. But then I came here and found friends, and…everything is different now. Better. I don’t want to go back.” He hadn’t realized how much he had changed until the words had left his lips.
Hannah nodded. “That’s good for you. I so understand what you mean.” She sat down on her bed, running a corner of her pillow through her fingers. “Will you tell me about your life?”
Sitting down beside her, Gabriel nodded. “Sure.”
***
“Finally,” Jordan grumbled as Gabriel came walking over the small slope leading down to the Dive. “What took you so long?”
“Did I miss anything?” In that moment, a loud scream came from a tree top to his right, closely followed by Eddie dropping out of the sky and hitting the water belly-first.
Jordan shook her head. “Same old, same old.”
Gabriel laughed. “Where are the others?”
“Eh…the water,” she said, lifting her eyebrows.
“Could you get them? I’ve got something to talk to you about.”
A little while later, they all sat on their towels. Jack and Jordan were munching their sandwiches while Eddie, his skin still red around the middle, dried off his hair. Liam sat leaning against a tree, Cat’s head on his lap, and ruffled the dog’s fur.
“What’s this about?” Still busy chewing, Jack’s words were a bit muffled as he spoke.
Gabriel took a deep breath. “I went to see Hannah this morning.”
“What?” Their eyes flew open. Jack even choked on his food so that Jordan struck him hard between the shoulder blades.
“You went back to the House of Horror?” Eddie asked, staring at him open-mouthed. “Without us?”
Gabriel wasn’t sure if Eddie was more upset about him going there at all or about not being asked to come along.
“I did,” he said, “and I need your help.”
After the initial shock, they all calmed down, waiting for him to continue his story.
“Look, I don’t really know what is going on there,” Gabriel tried to explain. “I think she doesn’t really want to talk about it but…she is just so alone, and no one should be alone. Not like that. She needs to get out of that room. And we need to help her.”
“Can’t she just walk out the front door?” Jordan wondered, furrows creasing her forehead.
Gabriel shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Jack asked, his voice a bit harsh. “Is she…a prisoner or something? Should we call the police?”
“Honestly, I don’t know,” Gabriel admitted. “From what she said, I don’t think that Mr. Hamilton is…a bad guy. It’s just…I don’t know. Maybe they’re just not communicating. Have you never had trouble with your parents because they just wouldn’t understand?”
“Sure, yes,” Jordan said. “But…what is it you want us to do?”
Gabriel grinned. “Get her out of the room. And since we can’t use the front door, we gotta go out the window. But I don’t think she’d make it down the tree. She seems a bit…”
“Fragile?” Liam suggested.
“Yes,” Gabriel nodded. “Maybe we could come up with some kind of rope ladder or something. What do you think?”
Eddie grinned. “You can count on us, Sir Gabriel. We will save the damsel in distress from her captor.”
Jordan laughed. “Sometimes you just crack me up.”
“Mission accomplished,” Eddie said, still grinning. “So, are we in then?”
Jack nodded. “We’re in.”
***
This time, Hannah opened the window after the first pebble hit the glass. As her head popped out and she saw them, a huge smile spread over her face that told Gabriel he was doing the right thing after all.
“You’re back already,” she whispered. “Do you want to come up?”
Gabriel shook his head, and her face darkened. “We want you to come down.”
Her eyes opened wide, but there was a sparkle of excitement in them. “I can’t.”
“You can,” Gabriel said, holding up the wrapped up rope ladder they had fashioned with the help of Major Sharpe. Without demanding details, he had helped them tie the ropes together and explained how to attach the ladder to the tree. “Jordan?”
She took the ladder and started up the tree.
In no time, she was up on the thick, horizontal branch that was serving as a gateway to Hannah’s room. They watched her inch forward, the ladder slung over her shoulder. When her hand touched the wall, Jordan sat down and took the ladder, unwrapping it. Slinging it around the branch, she threaded the lower end through the slings at the upper end, just like her dad had told her. Then she dropped the ladder off the tree, the lowest part vanishing in the high grass.
“That should do it,” she said, placing a foot on the first cross-rope. “It’s holding,” she added after putting all her weight on it. She looked up to the window where Hannah was standing with wide eyes. “The tiny likes of you should be fine.”
Hannah hesitated. She looked at Jordan and then at the ladder. Then her eyes shifted to the rest of them waiting down in the grass before moving up to the horizon in the distance. Slowly, the corners of her mouth curled up, and she smiled.
“Okay,” she breathed and swung a leg over the window sill.
“Give me your hand,” Jordan said, helping her climb out of the room and onto the branch.
Hannah moved slowly and with great apprehension. The muscles in her body seemed to tighten, and her forehead furrowed up in concentration. But she kept moving, putting one foot on the rope ladder and then the next. Her hands followed. All the while, she kept her eyes on Jordan, who nodded in encourag
ement.
When her feet finally touched the ground, the big smile was back on her face. “I’m outside,” she whispered. “I can’t believe I am outside. I know I shouldn’t be but…” She let her eyes sweep across her surroundings. “I just can’t help it.” For a moment, Hannah closed her eyes and breathed in the fresh air.
“All right then,” Gabriel said. “Let’s head over to the Sharpe’s and then to Mr. Garner’s field.”
“What?” Jordan asked, dropping down next to them. “Why?”
Gabriel couldn’t help but grin. “To get the next riddle.” The others stared at him. “Hannah figured out where to look.”
Laughing, Eddie put an arm around Hannah. “I like you already.”
Chapter 14 – Beyond
“Don’t start without us!” Jack called over his shoulder as he raced after his sister down the road, heading home. “We’ll be back in no time!”
“Promise!” Gabriel yelled after them. “I won’t say a word!”
“You’re not serious about that, are you?” Eddie asked, frowning at him. “You’re not really going to make us wait until they return.”
Gabriel shrugged. “Sorry.”
As the three of them, with Hannah by their side, walked their bikes down the road and then across the meadow to the southern part of town, Eddie insisted on grilling Gabriel and Hannah with questions. They in turn refused to answer them, and so Eddie spent most of the time torn between flattering them into submission and cursing them for not falling for it.
“Will you give it up?” Liam complained, shooting him an angry glare. “This is worse than Mr. Jones’ literature class.”
“But I WANT to know!” Eddie insisted.
“And I WANT you to shut the hell up!”
Watching them with wide eyes, Hannah laughed. “You are so real,” she said, shaking her head. “Not at all like the people in my books.”
Eddie frowned at that, but didn’t say another word.
“You must be a witch,” Gabriel whispered to Hannah. “I haven’t known him all that long, but he strikes me as someone who only shuts up when he’s sleeping.”
Another one of those enchanting smiles lit up Hannah’s face. “It’s so beautiful out here. The trees. All those flowers. And the air. Can you smell that? It never smells like that inside. No matter how many windows you open.” She breathed in deeply. “This is wonderful.” As they walked, Hannah held out her hand, letting the high grass run through her fingers.
Cat occasionally ran ahead, then after a while circled back and came running toward them, barking excitedly. Eyeing her from the side, Hannah always kept a safe distance to the dog. Cat, however, seemed intrigued by the new addition to their group. She looked at her curiously, and whenever she circled back, came running straight at Hannah and sniffed the air. Hannah always drew back as though scared.
“Don’t worry,” Liam said. “She is very friendly.”
“I’m sure she is,” Hannah replied, but pulled back her hand as Cat lifted her head to sniff it. “It’s just I…I might be allergic to dogs.”
“Oh, okay.” Liam turned to the dog. “Cat!” he called. “Get over here! Good girl!” He stroked her behind the ears, and she licked his hand eagerly, little yelps rising from her throat.
On foot−since Hannah had no bike−it took them no more than fifteen minutes to reach Mr. Garner’s field. From afar, they saw white clouds hovering over the green grass, moving here and there, baaing occasionally. As they got closer, the white clouds received heads and legs and finally looked like sheep.
As they walked up to the fence, they saw Jack and Jordan heading toward them from the opposite direction.
“What took you so long?” Eddie snapped as Jordan and Jack leaned their bikes against the fence next to their friends’. “We’ve been waiting here forever.”
“Oh, shut up, drama queen,” Jordan snapped back and walked past him.
“Do you have the bottle?” Gabriel asked.
Jack pulled it from his backpack. “What do we need it for?”
“We don’t need the bottle,” Gabriel said. “But the cloth that’s inside.”
“Okay, and what do we need that for?” he asked, pulling it out of the bottle.
Gabriel turned to Hannah, handing her his phone.
She took it, a shy smile flashing over her face. “Okay, here in the seventh line it reads From the ol’factory mate.”
“Yeah, what’s that mean?” Eddie asked. He turned his eyes to the horizon, looking in every direction. “I don’t see a factory anywhere.”
Hannah grinned. “Whoever wrote this tried to fool us. Olfactory is actually one word, and it refers to your sense of smell, like the terms auditory and visual refer to hearing and seeing.” Eddie nodded, a strange look on his face as though she had just explained a complicated Math equation. “So, I’m thinking that an olfactory mate may be a dog.” She pointed at Cat.
Aha expressions suddenly appeared on everyone’s faces. All eyes turned to the tricolored dog, who sat in the grass, watching two lambs race each other across the meadow.
“Okay, let’s try it,” Jordan said. She took the cloth from her brother and called Cat.
Instantly, the dog jumped up and raced to sit at her feet, eagerly awaiting orders. “Good girl,” Jordan said, patting her head. She held the piece of cloth before Cat’s nose and let her sniff it.
“I’m guessing Mr. Garner wouldn’t be too happy about students taking their dogs onto his field,” Liam said, looking at the sheep grazing peacefully. “So, maybe whatever they hid is near the fence. Or do you really want to take Cat onto the field?”
Jack shook his head. “Not if we don’t have to.”
Jumping up and down, Cat suddenly raced ahead, then circled back and again jumped up and down before Jordan.
“She’s got something?” Jordan said, and they all hurried after the dog.
Cat took them only a few yards down the fence before she stopped, circling the ground.
“Wow, that was fast,” Jordan said, ruffling Cat’s fur. “Here. Dig here.”
Jack took a little shovel from his backpack and began digging. All eyes were focused on the small hole in the ground, slowly growing bigger.
“This is so exciting,” Hannah whispered. “How many of these riddles have you solved?”
Thinking for a second, Liam said, “Actually, this is only our third.”
“And how many more are there?”
“We don’t know,” he admitted. “No one has ever found the pot of gold.”
“There’s a pot of gold?” Eddie asked.
Liam laughed. “Not a real one.”
Suddenly, the shovel struck something other than soft ground. Brushing away dirt, Jack pulled a small metal case wrapped in an old sheet with a checked pattern from the earth. “Looks like a lunch box.”
“Open it! Open it!” Eddie chanted.
“Do you think this is it?” Jordan asked.
“Just open it!”
With everyone clustered around him, Jack pried open the small lid. When it came off with a faint metallic scratching sound, the only thing they found inside was another folded sheet of paper.
“Looks like another riddle,” Gabriel said, taking the piece of paper and unfolding it. “Wow, this is longer than the others. I’m guessing it’s getting more difficult.”
“What does it say?” Hannah asked.
He held it for all of them to see.
I am a house but not a home
People come and go but don’t stay
While parents hold me dear
Young ones are reluctant to come near
And when I wave goodbye in the end of May
Through the far world they roam.
Even by another name I would smell as sweet
Do not confuse me with a weed
Handle me with care
And you shall be treated fair.
Eddie exhaled loudly and rolled his eyes. “Great, looks like a no-brainer a
gain.”
***
As the others rode off in the opposite direction, Liam and Gabriel accompanied Hannah back home. She still eyed everything around her with awe as though she had strayed into a dream and was afraid to wake up.
“I can’t imagine what it would be like to never go outside,” Liam said, watching her.
“I couldn’t imagine the opposite.” Hannah smiled. “Now, I don’t have to.” Suddenly, she stopped and looked at them, her face serious. “Thank you…for showing this to me. I don’t think I’ve ever had this much fun.”
They both nodded. “You’re welcome.” But Gabriel could see on Liam’s face that neither one of them had any idea what today had meant to Hannah.
“Oh my god, fireflies,” she exclaimed, clasping a hand over her mouth. All the way back at the edge of the forest, tiny lights danced in the air, only visible with the dark forest at their back. “I so wished I would see them again.”
“You like fireflies?” Liam asked.
Hannah nodded, still staring. “When I was little, my father told me that…” She turned to them, eyes searching their faces. “Eh, he told me that my mother was one of them.”
Their eyes widened a little, but they didn’t say anything.
Hannah laughed. “I know what you’re thinking. That I’m insane, right? To believe a story like that.” She shrugged. “I wasn’t even three when my mom died and…it helped me back then. Actually, it still does. It’s like she is not all the way gone. A piece of her is still with me.” Her gaze turned back to the edge of the forest. “And she loved fireflies.”
“I don’t think it’s silly,” Gabriel said. “Or insane. Not if it makes you feel better.”
She smiled at him. “It does.”
***
Climbing up the rope ladder to Hannah’s room, Gabriel felt the sun on his back. Once again, they would all meet at the dive.
“Are you ready to go?” he asked, leaning over the window sill. Instead of at her easel like the days before, he found Hannah stretched out on the bed though, a wet cloth on her forehead. “What happened? Are you all right?”
Her eyes opened, but she looked tired. “Just a headache,” Hannah breathed. “But I’m glad to see you. Can you stay a moment?”