“What is it?”

“Can’t you tell?”

“No.”

Picking up the skull, he gave it a little twist, pulling it off the spine. She flinched as he thrust it toward her.

“Don’t!” she squealed.

“Meow!”

“Elijah!”

“Well, you did ask what it was.”

She stared at hollow eye sockets. “It’s a cat?”

He pulled a grocery sack out of his book bag and began placing the bones in the sack.

“What are you going to do with the skeleton?”

“It’s my science project. From kitty to skeleton in seven months.”

“Where did you get the cat?”

“Found it.”

“You just found a dead cat?”

He looked up. His blue eyes were smiling. But these were no longer Tony Curtis eyes anymore; these eyes scared her. “Who said it was dead?”

Her heart was suddenly pounding. She took a step back. “You know, I think I have to go home now.”

“Why?”

“Homework. I’ve got homework.”

He was on his feet now, had sprung there effortlessly. The smile was gone, replaced by a look of quiet expectation.

“I’ll… see you at school,” she said. She backed away, glancing left and right at woods that looked the same in every direction. Which way had they come from? Which way should she go?

“But you just got here, Alice,” he said. He was holding something in his hand. Only as he raised it over his head did she see what it was.

A rock.

The blow sent her to her knees. She crouched in the dirt, her vision almost black, her limbs numb. She felt no pain, just dumb disbelief that he had hit her. She started to crawl, but could not see where she was going. Then he grabbed her ankles and yanked her backward. Her face scraped against the ground as he dragged her by her feet. She tried to kick free, tried to scream, but her mouth filled with dirt and twigs as he pulled her toward the pit. Just as her feet dropped over the edge, she grabbed a sapling and held on, her legs dangling into the hole.