I felt like I was in a spy movie, like the ones that were on televison on Saturday evenings. I was in the middle of a huddle that was Chris, Gordie, Teddy and Vern, and crouched down a little so no one could really see me while walking down Everett Street. Everyone in Castle Rock knew each other, and for sure one of Mom's fellow gossip-mongers would see me on the way to the Chambers' house and tell my parents. I couldn't take that risk. So even if I did feel foolish for the way I was walking and with my blonde hair in my face, I would do it, lest suffer the consequences later.

"Okay, we're here," Gordie announced, and I dared to look up. Sure enough Chris's small house was there on my right.

"Dad's not going to be back until suppertime," Chris said. Our little huddle broke up and we each walked over to his front door. "But somebody should keep lookout anyway, just..." He looked at me nervously. "Just in case."

I nodded, then caught a glimpse of Aunt Jane in the kitchen window. She was looking out at us, waving. "Here goes nothing," I muttered, and opened the door.

I was swept up almost immediately into a huge hug from my Aunt. She smelled like cookies. My mother never smelled like that because our maid alway did the cooking.

"Hannah Elise, you look lovely, honey," Aunt Jane exclaimed, tugging off her oven mitts and holding me at arms length. "And you've gotten so tall! The things I've missed out on..." she trailed off, her voice dripping with bitterness.

She turned to Chris. "Christopher, you shouldn't have brought her here. You know your father."

Chris cut her off. "It's okay, Mom. One of the guys is going to be on the lookout. The first sign of Dad, I'll help Hannah sneak out the back door. She really wanted to see you and the kids." Aunt Jane sighed, but didn't say anything else about it.

"Would you kids like some cookies?"

Gordie, Teddy and Vern all murmured in agreement. "Yeah, sure. Great, they smell amazing..." We all trooped into the Chambers' very tiny kitchen. It was about the size of my own bathroom at home, I thought, looking around sadly at the ripped wallpaper and the holey curtains above the sink.

As we were chowing down on our cookies and a small glass of milk each, I heard scuffling around the farthest corner.

"Hmmm," I said loudly, smiling at my Aunt. "Either you have lots of mice on the loose, or those have to be a couple of little troublemakers."

A head poked around the corner as soon as I said that, followed by a couple of more heads. Aunt Jane smiled at the children with dirty noses and said, "This is your cousin Hannah. Do you remember her?" The middle one, Emery, nodded shyly.

"You came over last Christmas, right?", he asked.

"That's right," I said. "You guys are getting so big!" Emery's cheeks turned pink.

"You were nice," he said. "You gave me a candy cane."

I grinned. "Yes. Did you like it?"

He nodded, stepping slowly out from around the corner and coming into the kitchen.

"I..."

Emery didn't get to finish his sentence because his siblings shouted suddenly, "Daddy!", and dissapeared back around the corner.

"Oh, shit!", Chris said. His mother gave him a threatining look, but he shrugged her off. "We forgot to keep watch, and of course he came home early. Come on, Hannah!" He grabbed me by the arm, and we jetted across the impossibly tiny living room to the back door.

"'Bye, Aunt Jane!", I shouted, tears starting to fall down my cheeks. This wasn't fair. I shouldn't have to run away from my family and leave them with a man they were scared of.

Chris shoved me non-too-gently out the door, while saying "I'll see you in school.", and slamming the door. Less than thirty seconds later, Gordie, Teddy and Vern were shoved out the door in the same fashion as I had been. Teddy had a big "Don't touch me" scowl on his face, Vern looked confused, and Gordie looked the way that I felt.

"Come on, we gotta go," he muttered, kicking hard at a clump of grass. We all followed him in the safety of the backyard, got into our huddle again, and walked silently back to Gordie's house.