positions like statues.
“No,” whispered Tuesday, who had started this. “No, please.”
Lannie stopped midway between her statues and the Trevors. Directly in front of Meghan’s. Meghan might as well have been frozen. She could not move. Could not think.
“Hi, West,” said Lannie across the frozen yards.
He did not speak. Perhaps he was as terrified as Meghan.
“Your heart is not in this, West,” said Lannie.
He did not move either. Had she frozen him without even touching?
“I want your heart, West,” said Lannie.
There was a thick dense silence.
Lannie’s smile was tiny and yet tall: her mouth opened up and down, instead of sideways, in a terrifying leer.
The five little children remained frozen in the snow. Perhaps their mothers were not looking out the window. Perhaps their mothers thought it was part of a game.
It was.
But not a game anybody should ever play.
Freeze Tag.
No, please, thought Meghan. Not the little children. Not just because I want to be the one at Pizza Hut with West. Set them free. Let them go.
“Lannie,” said West. His head sank down, so that he was looking at his own chest, the front of his own winter jacket. He seemed to lose some of the vertebrae in his backbone, and grow shorter and less strong. His voice scratched. He walked toward Lannie like an old man weighted with stones.
“You have my heart,” said West.
Chapter 10
“Y OU KNOW,” SAID MEGHAN’S father, “I haven’t seen Jason lately.”
Meghan and her mother were going through the movie listings. Once a month the Moore family had Movie Saturday. Driving to the huge, twelve movie theater that had opened a few years ago, they saw one movie at four o’clock, came out dizzy and pleased, went to have hamburgers, french fries, and shakes, and came back for a movie at seven. During the first movie they had candy and during the second movie they had popcorn.
Meghan loved Movie Day. When she watched a movie, she fell into it. It was completely real and completely absorbing. Even a bad movie was good when you saw it on a big screen. Whereas bad movies when you rented them to watch at home were just plain bad movies.
This month was a toughie: They wanted to see everything. “It’s better than the months when we don’t want to see anything,” her mother pointed out.
“I mean, I usually at least see Jason coming and going,” said Meghan’s father.
Meghan had not been thinking about Lannie for several weeks now. Ever since West had had to go on his knees to beg her to unfreeze the little children at the bus stop, she had decided just not to think about it again. There was nothing she could do. Nothing anybody could do. And as long as Lannie had West, the world was safe.
You have my heart, Lannie, West had said.
Meghan didn’t think about that either. It had sounded so true. You could almost see his heart, that day, red and bleeding and beating. As if he carried it over to her and set it down so she could have it.
Lannie had danced back among the children, as light as an elf on top of the snow. Flying past the little ones, she seemed hardly even to touch them. She skimmed along like a swallow in the sky.
But the children fell over in the snow, real again. There was a moment when they were all close to tears. All close to calling, Mommy! Mommy come and get me! Mommy , something’s wrong!
But the yellow schoolbus had turned the corner, and the children lined up to get on, bickering over who deserved to get on first. Shouting about who would sit with whom. And if they crowded closer to each other for warmth, and if a short, cold memory lay like ice on the backs of their necks, they did not say so out loud.
Nobody had ever said so out loud.
If I’m not thinking about Lannie, thought Meghan, I’m certainly not thinking about Jason.
Meghan tapped on the newspaper column with her bright blue soft-tipped pen. Meghan liked to write in many colors. She liked to underline in vivid yellow. She liked to
“No,” whispered Tuesday, who had started this. “No, please.”
Lannie stopped midway between her statues and the Trevors. Directly in front of Meghan’s. Meghan might as well have been frozen. She could not move. Could not think.
“Hi, West,” said Lannie across the frozen yards.
He did not speak. Perhaps he was as terrified as Meghan.
“Your heart is not in this, West,” said Lannie.
He did not move either. Had she frozen him without even touching?
“I want your heart, West,” said Lannie.
There was a thick dense silence.
Lannie’s smile was tiny and yet tall: her mouth opened up and down, instead of sideways, in a terrifying leer.
The five little children remained frozen in the snow. Perhaps their mothers were not looking out the window. Perhaps their mothers thought it was part of a game.
It was.
But not a game anybody should ever play.
Freeze Tag.
No, please, thought Meghan. Not the little children. Not just because I want to be the one at Pizza Hut with West. Set them free. Let them go.
“Lannie,” said West. His head sank down, so that he was looking at his own chest, the front of his own winter jacket. He seemed to lose some of the vertebrae in his backbone, and grow shorter and less strong. His voice scratched. He walked toward Lannie like an old man weighted with stones.
“You have my heart,” said West.
Chapter 10
“Y OU KNOW,” SAID MEGHAN’S father, “I haven’t seen Jason lately.”
Meghan and her mother were going through the movie listings. Once a month the Moore family had Movie Saturday. Driving to the huge, twelve movie theater that had opened a few years ago, they saw one movie at four o’clock, came out dizzy and pleased, went to have hamburgers, french fries, and shakes, and came back for a movie at seven. During the first movie they had candy and during the second movie they had popcorn.
Meghan loved Movie Day. When she watched a movie, she fell into it. It was completely real and completely absorbing. Even a bad movie was good when you saw it on a big screen. Whereas bad movies when you rented them to watch at home were just plain bad movies.
This month was a toughie: They wanted to see everything. “It’s better than the months when we don’t want to see anything,” her mother pointed out.
“I mean, I usually at least see Jason coming and going,” said Meghan’s father.
Meghan had not been thinking about Lannie for several weeks now. Ever since West had had to go on his knees to beg her to unfreeze the little children at the bus stop, she had decided just not to think about it again. There was nothing she could do. Nothing anybody could do. And as long as Lannie had West, the world was safe.
You have my heart, Lannie, West had said.
Meghan didn’t think about that either. It had sounded so true. You could almost see his heart, that day, red and bleeding and beating. As if he carried it over to her and set it down so she could have it.
Lannie had danced back among the children, as light as an elf on top of the snow. Flying past the little ones, she seemed hardly even to touch them. She skimmed along like a swallow in the sky.
But the children fell over in the snow, real again. There was a moment when they were all close to tears. All close to calling, Mommy! Mommy come and get me! Mommy , something’s wrong!
But the yellow schoolbus had turned the corner, and the children lined up to get on, bickering over who deserved to get on first. Shouting about who would sit with whom. And if they crowded closer to each other for warmth, and if a short, cold memory lay like ice on the backs of their necks, they did not say so out loud.
Nobody had ever said so out loud.
If I’m not thinking about Lannie, thought Meghan, I’m certainly not thinking about Jason.
Meghan tapped on the newspaper column with her bright blue soft-tipped pen. Meghan liked to write in many colors. She liked to underline in vivid yellow. She liked to
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