"Hey, L! Mr. Hendricks wants to see you!” Such a summons would have terrified Luke Garner only a few months earlier. When he’d first come to Hendricks School for Boys, the thought of having to talk to any grown-up, let alone the headmaster, would have turned him into a stammering, quaking fool desperately longing for a place to hide.

But that was back in April, and this was August. A lot had happened between April and August.

Now Luke just waved off the rising tide of “ooh’s” from his friends in math class.

“What’d you do, L? Have you been sneaking out to the woods again?” his friend John taunted him.

“Settle down, class,” the teacher, Mr. Rees, said mildly. “You may be excused, Mr., uh, Mr….”

Luke didn’t wait for Mr. Rees to try to remember his name. Names were slippery things at Hendricks School anyway. Luke, like all his friends, was registered under a different name from what he had grown up with. So it was always hard to know what to call people.

Luke edged his way past his classmates’ desks and slipped out the door. His friend They, who had delivered the message from Mr. Hendricks, was waiting for him.

“What’s this about?” Luke asked as the two fell into step together, walking down the hall.

“I don’t know. I just do what he tells me,” They said with a dispirited shrug.

Sometimes Luke wanted to take They by the shoulders, shake him, and yell, “Think for yourself! Open your eyes! Live a little!” Twelve years of hiding in a tiny room had turned They into a human turtle, always ready to pull back into his shell at the slightest hint of danger.

But Mr. Hendricks had taken a liking to They and was working with him privately. That was why They was running errands for him today.

They looked furtively over at Luke. His dark hair hung down into his eyes. “Do you suppose it’s — you know — time?”