Jeremy was the first to arrive at the schoolhouse. He let himself in, shrugged out of his raingear, and hung it up. He frowned at the water dripping onto the floor, then pulled out the troughs used to catch the drops. (Although this morning it was more like little rivers. Well, it was raining in rivers, so that was fair.) He built a fire in the stove, and took his seat as the teacher and a few of the little kids came in together.

Teacher smiled and thanked him, and the little ones said hello and seemed glad to see him. That was nice.

It was funny being back at school. Almost like he'd been gone for a long time instead of just a couple of weeks. They had been different weeks, though. He'd done some harder, realer work with the men and his brothers had listened to him when they looked at the maps.

He'd felt included.

That wasn't fair to his brothers. They included him, or tried to, in everything. He just wasn't usually interested, because a lot of it was stuff he either didn't know about or didn't care about. But this time, he had known. He knew the mountain, probably better than even Jason.

And they had listened and discussed his suggestion. He had felt so –well, he couldn't think of a word. Grown up? Valued? Involved? Not just a kid?

Whatever it was, it was pretty nice.

Teacher called him up to her desk to see how much he'd learned while he was out of school. Admittedly, not much. He'd been too busy doing a man's work to have time to be a schoolboy.

That was over for now, Jeremy thought, after getting his assignments and going back to his seat. If coming back to school and being treated like a schoolchild didn't cancel out the grown-up (or at least growing up) weeks, waking up this morning in Jason's bed had, before he even got to school.

He was still trying to figure that out. He didn't remember doing it. He did remember half-waking a couple of times overnight, when the rain or wind (or rain and wind) got noisy, but he thought he'd just buried himself deeper in the bedclothes.

The first time it had sounded like someone or something walking around outside. That was wind.

The next time it was someone or something tapping on the windows and doors, making them was most likely rain.

Then there had been the big thumps on the roof. Too hard and too heavy to be people, but it could still be things, he supposed. He was a little worried about what kind of things, and he had sat up in bed, and looked, and Jason was asleep in his bed. Josh was tossing and turning, so he was in his bed. The fire was burning brightly enough that nothing could come down the chimney. (Unless it was fireproof.) Everything was fine and safe, even if there were things blowing around banging and trying to get in.

Jeremy had taken a last look around the room, then retreated back into his warm cocoon, and when the sounds abated a bit, he fell back into sleep.

He thought maybe he had dreamed about when they first moved into town, after Mama had been died a while, and Da was being – strange. Not always Da. Making Jason go away, then sometimes going and getting him back. Making Josh go to school, and trying to make him do it, too, but he just couldn't.

Jeremy shivered and turned the page in his history book. He didn't like thinking about that time. He didn't remember much of it, and he didn't want to. It had been horrible.

He had just wanted to go back home.

Teacher called morning recess during a break in the rain, and sent the children outside.

The two little girls wanted to jump rope, and Jeremy agreed to be a rope turner for them. He liked doing that, no matter what the guys said; and the little girls liked for him to do it. (He wondered if the guys even could jump rope, especially in a dress. Haha, as if they ever would.)

"Didja make us new rhymes?" Sally asked.

"Uh – l-let m-me th-think."

"Halloween ones," Lissa demanded.

"Oh okay." That was mostly easy enough. A ghost host with the most posts, A fox in socks on the rocks. Something that could be scary and hairy that they could count the hairs of. He couldn't think of anything to rhyme, except berry, and berries weren't scary.

The little girls giggled and said berries were scary if they were big and hairy. Which was true, so Jeremy strung those words together into a counting rhyme, and sang it for the girls until they learned it.

Teacher rang the bell for them to come back in, but Jeremy's mind remained on rhymes. It was a good thing the next lesson was arithmetic, because it was fairly simple to think numbers rhythmically. After all, that's what rhythm was.

Witch should be easy, but it wasn't. The first word was a rhyme he wasn't supposed to say, and he was pretty sure he shouldn't say it – or teach it – to little girls. The next thought wasn't much better – a rich witch without a stitch – he blushed just thinking about that. That wouldn't be nice at all, especially to little girls when he was a boy, and a older than them one, too. Josh would have a fit!. He supposed the witch could have a snitch or a switch, twitches when the rich witch switches snitches that squish.

The children were all giggling, because he had missed that he was being called on.

Jeremy shook his head and turned a bright red. He didn't try to apologize, because he knew he wouldn't be able to get a word out.

Teacher looked disappointed, then smiled and skipped over him. The rest of the guys, who were older than him, were snickering and calling him teacher's pet.

He didn't need them anyway. He had his brothers, who were better than anyone.

And it was a good thing there just wasn't any rhyme for monster, because monsters weren't for playing games. (They were hairy and scary, though.)

/

"How was your day back at school?" Jason asked at supper.

Jeremy shrugged.

"Something must have happened," Josh said. "You're giving us the silent treatment."

"Maybe he's just feeling a bit overwhelmed. I don't know that I could do it, going from being a man on a mountain to a middling kid already behind on my lessons."

Jeremy gave him a startled look.

Jason smiled and nodded.

Jeremy nodded back. It was nice that Jason understood how he'd felt, and he hadn't said a word.

"Saw you with the jump rope this morning, saying nursery rhymes," Josh started to tease. "Those little girls really like you, don't they?"

Jeremy looked at Josh through his lashes, then back to his plate. He stabbed at the food. "Uh-huh." He wasn't going to say it was because he was nice to them. Heaven only knew what Josh would make of that, but it was the truth. But nursery rhymes? That gave him an idea.
"Hey."

Josh laughed. "Hey, I got him to speak!"

Jason laughed and Jeremy glared.

Josh turned his chair around, crossed his arms on the back of it and leaned toward the table. "Hey what?"

"Th-there's s-songs ab-bout ghostses and stuff, right?"

"A few. Folk ballads and sea songs. Why?"

"I w-was thinking."

"Since you were in school, I'd hope so."

"Ha ha. I w-was th-thinking, m-maybe instead of a st-st-story, I c-could m-make a song."

"And sing it instead of read it? That's a good idea. Did you ask your teacher?"

"Not-not y-yet. W-want to s-see if I c-can do it, first."

"There's not a lot of time left," Jason said.

"Uh-huh."

"So where/how do you want to start?" Josh asked. "What kind of song?"

" I don't even know! I want it to b-be my own, b-but I d-don't really know how they g-go. Mama used to sing one ab-bout a g-girl and a b-baby and a st-storm and a b-blue d-dress and her s-sailor m-man lost at sea, and then they w-were all together in the clouds, or s-something."

"I think you've got three or four songs all mixed together there, but – we can work with it. That is, if you want our help."

Jason put up his hands. "Leave me out of it. Until you need an audience, anyway."

"Don't worry, we weren't going to ask you to sing."

"Make sure it's yours, Jeremy. You don't want to be taking credit for Josh's work."

"Yeah, he'd n-never let me f-forget it." Jeremy grinned at his brothers, and ducked when Josh swiped at his head.