had always thought. Michael is my own Safe Zone. But that image of Michael was breaking apart.
Who are you, Michael? he seemed to be secretly asking. Who are you, and what’s going to happen to me?
Patrick turned onto his side, facing the window. Turning away because he knows I’m upset. Sleep tight, don’t let the Bellows bite, Bub. But they will in your dreams. Because you think I can’t protect you. Because—
“Do you know what a jack-o’-lantern is?” Michael said.
Patrick rolled back to Michael after a reluctant pause. “Pumpkin,” he said, his brow knitting, rubbing his nose on his sleeve.
“R-right,” Michael said, nodding in what he hoped was a thoughtful fashion. “But do you know where they come from, I mean?”
Patrick answered, “Walmart?”
“Ha, no. They’re actually this tradition from Ireland. People used to believe that on Halloween night, ghosts came back to earth.” You’re gonna scare him, idiot. “They believed this ’cause they were newbs,” he added.
“See, the Irish people thought that ghosts would go from house to house on Halloween, so—”
“Ghosts eat candy?”
Michael barked laughter. A sleep-mutter and a creak of springs sounded from Hank’s cot across the room. It felt wonderfully warm, wonderfully whole, to laugh like that.
Patrick’s face brightened a little.
“No, Bubbo, ghosts don’t trick-or-treat. They can’t hold the bags, for one thing. Ectoplasm all over the candy. Buzzzz killll.”
Patrick’s smile, touching his sleepy eyes, felt even better than Michael’s own laughter had. Actual fact: it wasn’t even a close call.
“So yeah, we got Ireland, dead folks, Halloween—”
“Heh. It’s funny,” Patrick said. “Monster stuff coming on Halloween. Like in The Game.”
Michael blinked. Jeezus cripes, he thought. Yeah. Wow.
He felt that feeling of things syncing. He thought of the church, of the hot-air balloon rising out of the night. He understood that Bobbie would perhaps have said that the feeling inside of him was the voice of something supernatural: a whisper emanating from some secret, tremendous Power that commanded everything that had happened in this world and everything yet to arrive. Michael had never believed in that sort of “God” before Halloween—and he certainly didn’t believe in it now, after Bobbie died so hideously, so unfairly. But he didn’t quite know what the feeling was. He knew that it was a little scary, a little out-of-control. But (perhaps because the feeling overpowered the pain) Michael didn’t push the feeling away.
He rode it. Like a dark wave.
“Yeah,” Michael whispered, “the ghosts did come back on Halloween. They came to possess living people. They used living bodies, like people-suits. But do you think the Irish wanted to be taken over?”
Patrick shook his head, happily engaged.
“Right on, duder. So they found a way to trick the ghosts into taking over something else,” Michael said. “Because the ghosts were looking for a warm body . . .”
The words hung there, Patrick looking confused.
“Warm body with a face . . .”
“A jack-o’-lantern!” Patrick exploded, like a kid yelling BARNYARD BINGO!
“Hey!” Hank hissed from his cot across the room.
“Hey-hey!” Patrick replied. To which Hank had no retort.
“Yep: jack-o’-lanterns. Like guards, to keep things safe. And Bub, guess what we got right here?”
Michael pointed out the window; they could just see it, the crest of orange-bright canvas on which snow fell. The jack-o’-lantern hot-air balloon.
Patrick finally slept.
Bub had just begun snoring when a hand grabbed Michael by the shoulder.
He flinched, the springs squeaking beneath him. But the person who grabbed him wasn’t who he’d been afraid it would be.
“Good evening,” Holly whispered. He could smell her citrusy gum, but he couldn’t see her expression: his own shadow obscured her face. “There’s something I need your help with,” she said, and cocked her head toward the door, silently leaving the Senate chambers before he could answer.
He thought: No, I shouldn’t go. I shouldn’t talk to anyone. I’ll have to just lie more, anyway.
But Michael couldn’t help it: he wanted to follow Holly.
The windows in the hallway looked out on the courtyard of Government Plaza. Michael saw that, for the first time since he’d reached the Safe Zone, Bellows had breached the defense systems on the bridge between the Capitol and downtown. Two dozen or so monsters—who must have gotten in through the fence’s “buffer zones” before Jopek could relock the gates—roamed freely in the fence maze.
Holly stood by the last window at the very end of the hall, looking outside, the moon so strong that she cast a shadow. Michael hesitated momentarily again, thinking it would be better to go back, but then walked on.