32. Jessie

Aurora was mad at the strange men, and I couldn't figure it out.

Aurora never got mad, and what was more, they seemed nice. They seemed... the one with the dark hair and blue eyes looked so familiar. Plus, they had a cool dog sitting with them, and they were feeding it bits of their sandwiches. That meant they were nice, right?

Still, I wasn't supposed to talk to strangers.

For the first time, I wondered why not.

I'd talked to Aurora, and she'd been a stranger, and that had been...

I didn't hear what anyone said, but Aurora was mad at the men, and they were mad back, but also, they were afraid of her. But Aurora wasn't scary, was she? She was my friend. She was glaring at them like she might erase them off the world, though, and that wasn't nice. Sometimes Aurora told Will he had to be nice, or he couldn't play anymore. He'd always grumble and scowl and then, well, he'd be nice.

So maybe even Will was afraid of Aurora.

She'd never been anything but nice to me, but if there was one thing in the whole world that I knew, it was that I didn't know all that much. It was kind of fun, most of the time. I got to learn things every single day. But when I thought that maybe Aurora was mean, well... there was something bad about that.

Something really bad, that made my stomach flip over and my head feel like it might float away, a loud noise like the ocean rushing in my ears.

When Aurora went back into the woods, I didn't follow her. I watched the men. They held onto each other for a while, speaking quietly, before turning to pack their picnic.

That made my stomach flutter. I didn't want them to pack and go. I didn't know why, but I wanted them to stay in the park. Having fun and eating and playing with their dog like before.

I didn't like that Aurora had made them sad.

It made me... angry. Angry with Aurora. Why be mean to them? They hadn't done anything wrong.

I didn't even know why, but when they left, I followed them.

I hadn't left the woods in... had I ever been outside the woods? Surely I had. There had been a big loud place with bright lights and huge white rooms. There had been... a boat? Airplanes?

For some reason, the farther I got out of the woods, the more it all came back to me. Airplanes and cars and a huge place with lots of empty space and weird breakable things that Daddy told me I wasn't allowed to touch, and—but who was Daddy?

And the frog room. There'd been a whole room covered with frogs. The cartoon character, my favorite, Froggo, yeah, but also just every single thing with a frog on it that Daddy had ever found, and gotten for me.

Because . . . he loved me.

My eyes hurt, and I didn't know why.

The men went to a big, beautiful old building I'd watched from the woods sometimes, though I'd never known why it was all that interesting. It seemed familiar, though. I thought maybe it was... it was a place where you gave people money, and then they kept things for you. They locked them up and kept them safe until you came back for them.

A stuffed Froggo, and my clothes, and things like that.

Were my clothes there?

No, that was silly. I was wearing my clothes. Whenever they got torn, Aurora fixed them. I didn't need any more clothes than that.

And I didn't need a stuffed frog, I had Francine, my real frog, who went everywhere with me. I glanced down at my pocket, where she was sitting, looking up at me.

Then I looked back up to see the men go into the building. I wanted to follow them, and I didn't know why.

Don't talk to strangers, Jessie. It could be dangerous, and you being safe is the most important thing in the world.

Me being safe. Someone cared about that. It was weird, though; the voice saying that in my head wasn't Aurora's. It wasn't Will or Mary or... no, it was a man. A grown man.

Immediately, my thoughts went to Peter. He'd played with us all once, and then he'd stopped. He'd built forts in the woods and helped me fight off pirates and showed me how to fly. Then, he'd gone to live in a big house with Everett and grown up and now he made cookies and ate pizza and—well, he still seemed happy.

He was still Peter.

He was just different, too.

But he'd been the most fun. More fun than Aurora or any of the rest, because he'd taken care of me. Protected me. He'd cared about me being safe.

I turned around and around, looking one way and the next, trying to remember... there. That was the way to Peter and Everett's house. Even if he wasn't the one who'd told me not to talk to strangers, I was sure he'd be able to explain who had. Or why. Or... why the whole thing made me feel funny from my head to my shaking fingers to my crampy feet.

It wasn't too hard to find Peter's house, once I remembered where I was. It was a beautiful place, nicer even than the one the men had gone into, with fresh white paint and pretty, glossy red shutters. I went around to the back. That was always the way we went into Peter and Everett's house.

Because we were always in the woods.

It was strange, but I didn't want to go into the woods just then. I felt like maybe all my strange, jangly thoughts might go away in the woods, like they usually did, but right then, I wanted them. They were like a puzzle, and I had to figure out the answer before I could forget about it.

Peter was sitting there on the back porch in a swing, covered in a blanket, and he smiled at me. "Hey Jessie. How are you doing?" He looked behind me, and seemed a little confused, but shrugged it off pretty quick.

It was because I wasn't with Aurora. I was always with Aurora, after all. We all were.

Except Peter wasn't. Not anymore.

"I saw some men," I told him, then stopped. That sounded ridiculous. I saw men all the time, and women and dogs and foxes and cats and birds and... seeing things wasn't important.

He didn't tell me I was being silly, though. He nodded and pushed himself off the swing. "Want to come inside? I think Everett left some brownies."

I remembered brownies. Well, mostly I remembered chocolate. It was the best. "Okay," I agreed immediately.

Then I remembered the important thing. "I think a man once told me not to talk to strangers," I told him as I followed him inside.

He looked down and me, nodding. "That seems reasonable. Well, except if you never talk to strangers, you'll never get to know anyone new. So they'll never not be strangers."

That made sense too. Odd.

"Unless," Peter said thoughtfully, as he poured a glass of milk, "you're supposed to wait for a grownup to meet the strangers, then introduce you. So then you know they're safe to talk to."

And that? That sounded right. Don't talk to strangers unless Daddy says it's okay.

But how could I know what Daddy thought, if he wasn't even there? Come to think of it, who was he?

Bright blue eyes and a huge smile came to mind. Oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and frog after frog after frog. Daddy.

Peter set a plate with a brownie in front of me, and a glass of milk next to it. "Jessie? Why are you crying?"

"I . . . I think I miss my Daddy."

His face crumpled, and he reached out and took my hand. "Did the strange men remind you of him?"

The strange... For a moment, all I could do was stare into space. Blue eyes. Dark hair. Black shirt with swirly words on it.

Daddy.

My hand shot out and snatched Peter's. "It was him, Peter. It was my daddy. I saw him. I... he went in the place where you have to pay to keep your things. My daddy is inside it."

Peter's eyes narrowed, considering. He could fix it. Peter was smart. He would know how to fix it. Or maybe I could go bang on the door and shout for Daddy to come out.

Or maybe... maybe I could go back in the woods and ask Aurora for help.

Peter slid a hand into his pocket and when he brought it out again, it held a thick, shiny gold coin with a bird facing up. He flipped it over and over again, and for a second, I thought there was a frog on it. "Aurora gave me this when I left the woods. She said I could use it if I needed money. I don't know... I think it's not the kind of money they take at the store, that's all plastic cards and phone tapping, but maybe it'll help with the place your dad went?"

Plastic cards. I remembered that. Daddy had a black plastic card that always made everyone act weird to him, and it made him sad. I liked this better. The frog coin.

Peter set it in my palm and wrapped my fingers around it, and it was warm in my hand. Yes. This would help.

They'd have to let me in to find Daddy.

"Do you want me to go with you?" Peter asked, looking like he was ready to jump up and rush off with me.

I shook my head. "No. I just need Daddy."

I didn't even eat my brownie before I rushed back out and toward the place I'd seen Daddy. He had to still be there. Or he'd come back. He'd said so. He'd always come back for me.