‘Why did you leave?’ Max asks.
‘I had to leave. If I stayed here, I thought you would stay here.’
‘I did stay here,’ Max says. His eyes narrow even farther. He sounds confused.
‘I know,’ I say. ‘But I was afraid that if I stayed here, you would stay with Mrs Patterson for ever. You’re not supposed to be here, Max.’
‘Yes, I am. Stop it, Budo. You’re not talking right.’
‘Max, you have to leave this place.’
‘No. I don’t,’ Max says.
He is starting to get upset. His cheeks are turning red and he is spitting his words. I have to be careful. I need to get Max just the right amount of upset. If he gets too upset, he could get stuck.
‘Yes, you do,’ I say. ‘You have to leave. You don’t belong here.’
‘Mrs Patterson says that I belong here. She said you can stay here, too.’
‘Mrs Patterson is bad,’ I say.
‘No,’ Max says. He shouts the word. ‘Mrs Patterson takes care of me. She gave me Lego and army men and lets me eat grilled cheese for dinner whenever I want it. She told her mom that I am a good boy. She can’t be bad.’
‘This is not a good place,’ I say.
‘Yes, it is. Stop it, Budo. You’re not talking right. You’re not being a good friend. Why aren’t you talking right?’
‘You have to leave, Max. If you don’t, you will never see your mom or dad or Mrs Gosk or anyone else ever again.’
‘I will see you,’ Max says. ‘And Mrs Patterson said I can see Mommy and Daddy again soon.’
‘She is lying about your mom and dad, and you know it.’
Max says nothing. This is a good sign.
‘And if you stay here, you will never see me again, either,’ I say.
‘Stop it. You’re not talking right.’ Max’s hands clench into tiny fists. For a second, he reminds me of Oswald.
‘I mean it,’ I say. ‘You’ll never, ever see me again.’
‘Why?’ Max asks. There is fear in his voice now. This is good.
‘I am leaving. And I am not coming back.’
‘No,’ Max says.
But this is not a command. It is a request. He is asking me to stay. He is almost begging me to stay. Now there is hope.
‘Yes,’ I say. ‘I am leaving. I am never, ever coming back.’
‘Please, Budo. Don’t leave.’
‘I am leaving.’
‘No. Please don’t leave.’
‘I am leaving,’ I say, trying to make my voice like cold, hard stone. ‘You can leave, too. Or you can stay here for ever.’
‘I can’t leave,’ Max says. I hear panic in his voice now. ‘Mrs Patterson won’t let me leave.’
‘That is why you have to escape, Max.’
‘I can’t.’
‘Yes, you can.’
‘I can’t,’ Max says, and it sounds as if he might cry. ‘Mrs Patterson won’t let me out.’
‘The door is open,’ I say. I point to the open door.
‘The door is open?’ Max says, finally noticing.
‘Mrs Patterson left the door open,’ I say.
‘Liar, liar, pants are on fire!’ Oswald says from far away. I smile, wondering where he learned that.
‘Listen to me, Max. This is the only time that Mrs Patterson will forget to lock the door. You have to go now.’
‘Budo, please stay with me. We can just stay here and play with army men and Lego and video games.’
‘No, we can’t. I am leaving.’
‘Why are you being so mean?’ Oswald asks.
His voice is like an old whisper. It is like dust. I want to stop and say goodbye to him. Thank him for what he has done. I feel like he could be gone at any second. But I cannot stop. Max is toppling. I can feel it. I need to finish the job.
I turn and take three steps toward the open door.
‘Please, Budo.’ Max is pleading now. I can hear the tears in his eyes.
‘No. I am leaving and never coming back.’
‘Please, Budo,’ Max says, and my heart breaks a little to hear him so frightened. This is what I wanted, but I didn’t know how hard it would be. The right thing and the easy thing are never the same thing, and this is the truest right now.
‘Please don’t leave me,’ Max begs.
I decide that this is the moment to make my stand. I change my voice from stone to ice. ‘Mrs Patterson is bad, Max. You are afraid to say it, but you know it. But she is even worse than you know. She is planning on taking you away from this room. Away from this house. Far, far away. You will never see your mom or dad again. You will never see me again. Everything is going to change for ever and ever unless you go now. You have to go now.’
‘Please, Budo.’ Max is crying now.
‘I promise that if you leave now, you will be safe. You will get away from Mrs Patterson. You will make it home. You will see your mom and dad tonight. Cross my heart and hope to die. But we have to go now. Will you follow me now?’
Max is weeping. Tears are spilling down his cheeks. He can barely catch his breath. But in between the sobs, Max nods.
He nods.
We have a chance.
CHAPTER 57
Mrs Patterson is in her bedroom. She is packing another box with things from under her bathroom sink. The clock above the stove reads 6.42. It is time to go.
I go back to the basement. Max is standing by the staircase. Right where I left him. He is holding the locomotive from his Lego train in his hands. He is clinging to it like it is a life preserver. His pants pocket is bulging with something, too. I do not ask what.
I wonder if Oswald is still here. I look around but cannot see him.
‘I’m here,’ he says, waving his hand. The movement catches my eye. He is standing behind Max but it sounds like he is on the other side of the Grand Canyon. ‘Did you think you lost me?’
I smile.
‘Mrs Patterson is upstairs,’ I say. ‘In her bedroom. You are going to walk up the stairs and follow me. We are going to try to get out through the sliding glass door in the dining room. The door should open quietly. I watched her open it once. It didn’t squeak. Once we are outside, you are going to turn right and run as fast as you can into the woods.’
‘Okay,’ Max says. His whole body is shaking. He is terrified.
‘You can do this, Max.’
‘Okay,’ he says. But he does not believe me.
We climb the stairs and enter the hallway. The front door is to the right. I think again about sending Max out this door and decide against it. It is at the foot of the stairs. Mrs Patterson might hear it open.
‘This way,’ I say, leading Max through the kitchen and into the dining room. ‘The handle is on the right-hand side. Just give the door a pull.’
Max shifts the Lego train to his left hand and grabs the handle with his right. He pulls. The door moves a teeny tiny bit and then stops with a thud.
‘Oh, no,’ I say, feeling the first bits of panic race through me. ‘Max, we have to go to—’ Before I can finish my sentence, Max has turned a knob on the door. ‘It was locked,’ he whispers. ‘That’s all.’
He pulls on the door a second time and the glass slides open with a quiet hiss.
For a moment, I am excited. Not only is the door open but Max opened it. He solved the problem. Max does not solve problems. Max becomes trapped inside problems.
This is a good sign.
But as the door slides open, three beeps ring out throughout the house. The alarm has not gone off, but it is the beeps that tell the person who owns the door that the alarm is working but is turned off. Max’s parents’ doors make the same sound. I don’t even notice the beeps anymore because they beep every time someone opens the door. They beep all the time.
I do not think these three beeps will go unnoticed.
As if to prove the point, I hear something drop to the floor directly above us. A second later footsteps thump quickly across the upstairs floor.
>
‘She’s coming!’ I shout. ‘Run!’
Max does not move. He stands in the open doorway, frozen in place. The sound of Mrs Patterson’s charge across the second floor has stopped him in his tracks.
‘Max, if you do not run now, you will never escape.’
I realize how true this is as I say the words. I have taken a big chance. If Mrs Patterson catches Max now, she will never give him another chance to escape ever again. This is the one chance I have to get Max home.
And he is still not moving.
I hear Mrs Patterson. She is on the stairs now.
‘Max. Please run now. I am leaving with or without you. I am not staying here. There is no time. Your mom and dad are waiting. Mrs Gosk is waiting. Run!’
Something I said makes him move. I wish I knew what it was so I could use it again. I think it was maybe the mention of his mom.
Max steps into the night. It is dark and I am worried that this will stop Max again but it does not. Max is afraid of the dark but now he is more afraid of Mrs Patterson. He has admitted that he is afraid of her, and this is good. He crosses Mrs Patterson’s deck and walks down the three steps onto the grass. He looks out at the pond. The moon is hanging just above the trees on the opposite side. White light shimmers on the still water.
The pale moonlight, I think. Max is dancing with the devil in the pale moonlight for real now.
‘Turn right and run!’ I scream as loud as I can. As angry as I can.
Max turns and runs into the trees.
I turn to look back at the door. Mrs Patterson is not there yet. She must have decided to check the front door first.
Oswald is standing in the doorway. He shimmers in the mixing of moonlight and light from inside the house like hot air off a parking lot. He is disappearing. It is happening right now. Right in front of my eyes.
‘Run, Budo!’ he shouts.
The sound coming from his mouth does not sound like a voice anymore. It sounds more like a distant memory. A memory almost forgotten, except now I know that Oswald was right. He will never be forgotten.
‘Save Max,’ he says.
He is probably shouting these words. Roaring this all-important final command. The words that have ended his life. But they come to me as a whisper’s whisper.
‘I have one more thing to do.’
I cannot run. I feel like Max. I am stuck in place. Oswald the Giant, imaginary friend of John the Lunatic, the only imaginary friend to have feet in both worlds, is dying before my eyes.
I am responsible for his death.
Just as I expect him to wink out for ever, he turns and looks back inside the house. He waits a second, drops to one knee and places his hands out in front of him like a boy showing his mother how many fingers make ten. I cannot see the details that once made Oswald real, but I do not need to see them to know that his muscles are popping for the last time. The veins in his neck are pulsing their final pulses. He is Oswald the Giant once again, one more time, preparing for battle.
Then he turns back to me, sees me frozen on the lawn, the pale moon hanging behind me, and says, ‘Goodbye, Budo.’
I can no longer hear his words, but they somehow find their way into my mind.
And then, ‘Thank you.’
At that moment, Mrs Patterson comes into view. She is running from the kitchen into the dining room and toward the open door. She is running faster than I thought she ever could, and in that moment I realize that Max’s escape will not end with his disappearance into the trees.
It has just begun.
Oswald was right. Everyone is somebody’s devil, and Mrs Patterson is Max’s devil.
And mine.
Then the thought hits me.
Oswald is Mrs Patterson’s devil. Oswald the Giant is the devil in the pale moonlight now.
An instant later, Mrs Patterson charges into the open doorway and hits the crouching, shimmering, dying Oswald. Her right knee strikes his right hand and she topples over, head first, flying up and over and down onto the deck with a grunt and a bang and a thump. She slides all the way to the edge of the deck and then rolls down the three stairs to the grass, stopping inches before my feet.
I look up. I look to the doorway, looking for my brave and dying friend, and I already know that he is gone.
‘You saved Max,’ I say to my friend, but no one is listening anymore.
Then I hear Max shout. ‘Budo!’
Mrs Patterson’s head rises from the grass. She pulls herself up on one arm. She looks in the direction of Max’s voice. A second later, she rises to her feet.
I turn and run.
Max’s escape has just begun.
CHAPTER 58
Max is standing behind a tree. He is hugging his Lego train like it is a teddy bear. Some of the pieces have broken off but I do not think Max has noticed. He is shaking all over. It is cold and Max is not wearing a coat, but I do not think this is why he is shaking.
‘You can’t stay here,’ I say. ‘You have to run.’
‘Make her stop,’ Max whispers.
‘I can’t,’ I say. ‘You have to run.’
I listen. I expect to hear Mrs Patterson crashing through the trees and bushes, but I do not. She is probably walking slowly. Trying to be quiet. She is probably trying to sneak up on Max so that she can grab him.
‘Max, you have to run,’ I say again.
‘I can’t.’
‘You have to.’
At that moment a beam of light passes through the trees. I look back toward Mrs Patterson’s house. There is a dot of bright light near the edge of the trees.
A flashlight.
Mrs Patterson went back inside the house for a flashlight.
‘Max, if she finds you, she will take you away for ever and you will be alone for ever.’
‘I’ll have you,’ Max says.
‘No, you won’t.’
‘Yes, I will. You say that you will leave me, but you won’t leave me,’ he says. ‘I know it.’
Max is right. I would never leave him. But this is no time for the truth. I must lie to Max in a way I have never done before. In a way I never thought I would ever, ever do.
‘Max,’ I say, looking him in the eyes. ‘I am not real. I am imaginary.’
‘No, you’re not,’ he says. ‘Stop it.’
‘It’s true. I am imaginary. You are all alone right now, Max. You can see me, but I am not really here. I am imaginary. I can’t help you, Max. You have to help yourself.’
The beam of light passes across the trees to the left. In the direction of the pond. Mrs Patterson is moving down the hill, slightly away from Max, but there is not much ground between Max and the pond. Even if she is heading in the wrong direction, she will see him soon. The moon is lighting up the forest and Mrs Patterson has a flashlight.
A second later we hear the first snap of a branch on the ground. She is getting close.
Max startles and almost drops his train. ‘Which way?’ he asks. ‘Which way should I run?’
‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘I’m imaginary. You tell me which way.’
Another branch snaps, this one much closer, and Max turns and runs up and to the right, away from the water and away from Mrs Patterson. But he moves too fast and too loud. The light from the flashlight swerves in his direction and lands on his back.
‘Max!’ Mrs Patterson yells. ‘Wait!’
When Max hears her voice, he runs faster. I run, too.
I lose sight of Max as he runs through a tight bunch of pine trees. But he is headed in the right direction. There are five houses on this side of the road before the end of the street, and he is getting close to Mrs Patterson’s closest neighbor. I can see the lights of the neighbor’s house through the trees. But somehow I have lost Max. He was twenty or thirty steps in front of me but now he is gone.
I stop running. I walk. I want to listen and look. Mrs Patterson has stopped running, too. She is walking, not too far behind me and off to my left, doing the same thi
ng I am doing.
We are both looking for Max.
‘Budo!’
Max calls my name, but this time it is a whisper. The voice comes from my right so I look in that direction. I see trees and rocks and leaves and the glow of street lights at the top of the hill where the forest meets the road, but no Max.
‘Budo,’ he whispers again and I become afraid. Max is trying to be quiet but Mrs Patterson is too close. He cannot afford to make another sound.
Then I see him.
There is a rock and a tree with leaves piled in between them, probably pushed there by the wind. Max has buried himself in the leaves. I can see his tiny hand waving to me from underneath the pile.
I get down on my hands and knees and crawl to him, leaning against the opposite side of the rock.
‘Max, what are you doing?’ I whisper as softly as I can so Max will do the same.
‘Waiting,’ Max says.
‘What?’
‘This is what a sniper does,’ Max whispers. ‘He lets the enemy soldiers walk right by them before they attack.’
‘You can’t attack Mrs Patterson.’
‘No. I will wait until—’
Max stops talking as the sound of footsteps rustling in leaves reaches us. A second later the flashlight passes over the rock where I am sitting and where Max lies buried under leaves.
I look up. I can see Mrs Patterson now. I can see her outline in the moonlight. She is close. Fifty steps away. Then thirty. Then twenty. She is walking quickly as if she knows exactly where Max is hiding. If she does not change direction, she may step right on top of Max.
‘Max,’ I say. ‘Don’t move. She’s coming.’
As I sit and wait for Max to be caught, I think about Max’s decision to hide under the leaves. This is what a sniper does, he said.
Max read a book about war. Actually, he has read a million books about war, but now he is using what he read to save himself. In a strange forest. At night. With someone chasing him. And with his best friend insisting that he is not real.