“Instead, you gave me a new way forward and helped me to choose a new name and took me to Miss Lovely.”
Miss Lovely, the proprietor of The Blue House Inn. Back then she ran a group home for kids.
After my world exploded, she offered me a safe place to live, homeschooled me until I took my GED, helped me apply to college. There were other kids, too, over the couple of years I was with her, who came and went. A runaway she found at the bus station who stayed a few nights, then left with all the money Miss Lovely had hidden in a jar in a high kitchen cabinet. There was another boy whose mother had passed, and whose father was in rehab. He was quiet, read a lot. He wasn’t there long, didn’t say much.
I barely remember him or anything about that time. I was in a fog of grief. But Miss Lovely took care of all of us with kindness and laughter. She taught me to cook, to sew, how to make a bed like a soldier. She’s gone now, too. Her daughter, who was already grown when I went to live with Miss Lovely, owns the inn now, hires out its operation and management. She never sets foot in The Hollows.
“She was good to me. Miss Lovely. And Dr. Cooper, too. They helped me to heal, build a life.”
“Yes, but Maggie was right. You can’t hide from the truth.”
He walks over to the article on the desk, holds it up to me.
“Maybe not,” I concede, taking it.
“What else can I do to help now?” he asks.
Jones Cooper is a native son of The Hollows. He knows how it works, its history, has access to all its dark passages. Maybe that’s why I’m here. He’s the guide I need to this place. If what’s happening now is in any way connected to what happened to me then, Jones Cooper is the one to ask.
I tell him about the dark web, about the man who helped me create Wren Greenwood online, and bury all traces of my past, how I reached out to him to see what he knew, what he could find. I tell him about the money I paid, and how I’m waiting now. He doesn’t like that, gives me a frown.
“The dark web,” he says. “Is that a thing? I thought it was an urban legend.”
“It’s very real.”
“I don’t get it.”
There’s a deep gulf between our generations. I’m a tech native; he’s a late and reluctant adopter. His desktop is ancient with a huge screen and a hulking CPU on the floor. There’s a flip phone on the coffee table.
I explain it to him. “It’s a part of the internet that’s untraceable. On the conventional web using servers like Safari or Chrome, you leave a digital trail that anyone can find. But on the dark web, accessed by Tor, no one can detect your activity. It’s a black market for—anything. Guns. Drugs. Hired killers. Identity change. There are people who can get you anything, help you do anything.”
He raises his eyebrow, the skeptic.
“And this guy Adam—you met him online, too.”
“Right.”
“I’m seeing a pattern here. The further you get from the real world, the darker and more dangerous it all gets.”
He has a point.
“It’s the way of it now, though.”
“Doesn’t have to be.”
“Now you sound like my father. He wanted us to escape technology, the world of men. He told us that their world was about to implode, that global collapse was around the corner. And that we would be safe on our land, living as we were intended to live in harmony with nature.”
He nods, thoughtful, leaning against his desk, hands dug in his pockets.
“But the world of men still stands,” I say. “It was we who imploded. It was our world that collapsed.”
He gives an easy nod, taking it in, considering.
“So,” he says finally. “I’ll go back over my case notes, and I’ll talk to the new chief. I’ll do some digging.”
“Looking for what?”
“I guess I’ll know it if I find it.”
This makes me smile, that kind of practical two feet on the ground idea of things.
He looks at his watch. “I think Maggie is expecting us both for lunch.”
“I really should go,” I say.
“Stay,” he says. It’s gentle. A kind nudge. “Your problems will wait until after a meal with old friends.”
The world slows down here. That’s what my father loved about it. When you cross over the city line, you draw a breath, release it slowly. The frenetic pace of our modern world shifts away.
There isn’t always cell service, many dead spots, calls just dropped or never come through at all. Voice mail lags. My phone has gone strangely quiet. I have to go back to my computer to check email. For some reason, it won’t download to my phone here.