I couldn't sleep that night. I needed to know what that boy had been referring to. I couldn't put my family at risk if something bad was going on.

The next day, I fully planned on talking to the boy from the day prior and learning more. I was almost, dare I say it, excited for school. But I didn't want mom to know that.

I waited until she'd hugged me goodbye before I went to find the boy. I didn't want to make it obvious that I was singling him out but I needed to know more.

He was playing with blocks in the corner. Thankfully, there was a bookshelf near him that I could use to hide behind so neither of the teachers would see us. I didn't want to make anyone suspicious of either of us.

I sat down against the shelves and pretended to play with the blocks. "What all do you know?"

He looked up at me, his forehead scrunched. "What are you talking about?"

I narrowed my eyes at him. "You told me yesterday that something weird was going on around here. I want to know what that is."

He shook his head. "I don't know what you're talking about."

I exhaled deeply and threw down the blocks I'd been holding onto. "Yes, you do!"

"Lyla, Alex, keep it down over there." Ms. Diane called from her desk.

Alex picked up the blocks I'd thrown and set them in the pile between us. Then he grabbed my hand and stood, pulling me to my feet, also. "Come color with me."

I had no idea why he was acting so weird and why he suddenly wanted to color. I didn't have time to argue as he yanked me from the blocks and to the table where we were about to have breakfast. We only had about twenty minutes before breakfast and then we'd be separated. At least to the point of having a private conversation.

He grabbed the box of crayons and a pad of plain white paper and sat down at the table. He patted the chair beside me. "Color."

I rolled my eyes and sat down beside him. I felt defeated. I'd wanted to have a conversation with him about the town and how screwed up it was. I couldn't have that if he was acting like a baby.

He scribbled something on the paper in front of him then slid it to me. There were words written on it in green crayon. Can't talk here.

I scrunched my eyebrows together and looked over at him. He was focused on the paper, trying not to draw attention to us and what he was doing. "Alex, I need to know."

He pulled the paper over in front of him and wrote something else down. Tonight.

I grabbed a pink crayon from the box and wrote: How? When?

Your backdoor after your parents go to sleep.

Before he or I could write anything more, he grabbed a black crayon and scribbled over every word, making it impossible to see what we had written. It was smart and probably saved us a lot of trouble.

I stared at him for several seconds before he grabbed another piece of paper and started coloring like a toddler would. It seemed that a few minutes of clarity were all I was going to get from him.

But I had to take what I could get for the time being. I'd have to wait until dark to find out more. And I couldn't freaking wait.