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“There was this big shot, the type who makes or breaks dreams like my folks had for me. One day I was told that I had an interview with him. Just me. No Mom. No Dad. They dolled me up, took me to this golden glass tower, escorted me to the right floor, and left me on my own. I wasn’t all that scared. When you’re—young—one big shot is pretty much the same as the others. Parents are what really matters.

“I walked into that office and a slim, baby-faced man ushered me right into the Presence. I went in, took the chair I was offered, and parroted the proper responses to familiar questions. Mr. Big seemed kind, if sorta gross: fat and over-dressed.

“At one point, he asked me to stand up and read a script for him. I did and while I was, he got up and walked around me. I was used to being looked at, but something about the way he did it, staring and circling closer and closer, gave me the creeps. Then he came up behind me, slid his arms around me, and grabbed my breasts—what I had. I flipped out, dropped the script and everything. I think I made some excuse about needing the bathroom, because Mr. Big pointed to a door.

“I got through there and sure enough, there was a fancy little bathroom. My Mom was there, too, and I was so scared that I didn’t even wonder how she got in there. I started to blab everything to her, but she hushed me and said, ‘I know you were startled, but he’s a very important man. I want you to think about that.’”

Abalone’s eyes have grown very wide, but not one tear mars their brightness.

“I thought. Then I went back in there and let that bastard fuck me, knowing Mom was hearing every bit—hell, she might have been filming it for all I know. When I left there, Mom and Dad took me to a fancy restaurant, showing me the contract that Mr. Big had signed.

“That night, I left. All I took was the computer and I started stealing right off, replaced my old board and…”

She shrugs.

I reach out and squeeze her. “One fire burns out another’s burning; one pain is lessen’d by another’s anguish.”

“Your dream stop bugging you?” Her smile is almost genuine. “That’s good. Anyhow, I’d kinda wanted you to know all that, but it’s not easy to talk about and I really don’t want anyone else to know. I think if my folks find me, they still have legal right to me.”

“Your secret is safe with me, Abalone,” Professor Isabella promises, her face drawn and tight.

I hug Abalone again. “The rest is silence.”

She hugs me back. “I trust you, Prof, and Sarah, you’d be impossible to get anything from, even if you would tell. I’m safe with you. Now we have to make you safe from them.”

Twelve

A WEEK GOES BY BEFORE THE OWL BEGINS TO COMMUNICATE with me. At first, all there is are sighs and vague feelings, similar to those I had gotten from the apartment house. Within two weeks, it was calling to me in little chirps and hoots.

Professor Isabella had been reading to me about saw-whet owls, so I knew what to expect. Betwixt and Between reassure me that words will come in time.

“We didn’t talk People at first,” Betwixt confides when Between is napping. “At least I don’t think so.”

He pauses as if puzzled. “I don’t know what we were talking; all I know is that Dylan started understanding us better and we did him.”

This raises something I have been wondering about, but I must search for words and even when I find some I know they are not quite what I want.

“Speech is civilization itself,” I say. “The word, even the most contradictory word, preserves contact—it is silence which isolates.”

Hearing me, Between wakes up, catching only the tail end of my borrowings.

“Wha’ she say?” He yawns.

“I was telling her not to worry too much about the owl talking and telling her about Dylan and us. Then she asked something about speech.”

“What did you say?” Between asks.

I repeat myself.

“Are you worrying about the owl still?”

I shake my head. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

“Oh, you want to know if Dylan could talk,” Betwixt says. “Yes, he