“As long as we’re not, like, leaving the state or anything.”

“You’ll see.”

And then instead of setting off back down my street, Grace turned and started making her way into the long grass where the street ended.

“Are you serious?” I said. “There’s a gully down there. It’s a storm-water drain.”

“Shortcut” is all Grace said, plunging farther into the darkness.

“I mean, are you okay with your leg and everything?” I shouted after her, not knowing if it was politically correct or not to even mention that I’d noticed she walked with a limp. “The ground is really uneven!”

“Shortcut!”

Grace started swatting the grass away with her cane then, like she was an explorer hacking her way through a jungle. I followed the trail she cut through the greenery, keeping close enough to her so that if she stumbled I’d be able to catch her, but—even though her limp was more pronounced—she never did.

We followed the drain for ten minutes, making small talk about the newspaper, until the gully spat us out on the main road near a bus stop. We sat and waited for a bus in fluorescent light, me kind of expecting it to be a Greyhound that would take us halfway across the country, but the one Grace hailed was the one that went into the city. She paid my fare like she said she would, and then we sat in the disabled seating section, which Grace said was (and I quote) “the one perk of being a cripple.”

The city at nighttime was spectacular. I’m all for mountains and forests and glass-clear rivers, but there is something about the million burning lights of a city in the dark that just gets to me. Maybe because it reminds me of the galaxy.

When we got off the bus, Grace led me straight to the closest convenience store.

“We require snacks,” she said. “My treat.”

“You are too kind to me. Keep taking care of me like this and I’ll become a kept man.” I chose some M&M’s and Coke. Grace picked a bag of salt-and-vinegar chips (which—I know it sounds weird—just totally suited her), a Vitaminwater, and a loaf of cheap white bread. Then we walked. We walked for so long, I started to think that this was the hanging out and that we didn’t actually have an actual destination, but Grace wouldn’t let me eat my snack yet, despite my protests.

Eventually she came to a stop at a tall iron fence with a thick hedge growing on the other side and said, “Ta-da.”

“It’s a . . . fence. I mean, it’s a very nice fence. And I admire the workmanship. But it’s a fence.”

“What’s behind the fence is what we came for.”

“Which is?”

“I am so pleased you asked. Behind this fence is one of this city’s best-kept secrets. Did you know that before the subway was built, a steam train line used to run right through the business district?”

“I did not, but now that you mention it, I suppose it makes sense.”

“Behind the fence is the last steam train station in the city. It’s been permanently closed to the public for decades.”

“Then why are we here?”

Grace kept an entirely straight face as she put her loaf of bread down at her feet, held her cane in her right hand like a javelin, and launched it over the hedge.

“Oops. I’d better go get that,” she said. Then she stepped up onto the fence with her good leg and hauled herself up.

“What are you doing?” I said.

“Trespassing, obviously. C’mon.”

“What if someone calls the police?”

“I’ll tell them I lured you here and seduced you into breaking the law.”

“Yeah. Like that’s gonna work.”

“C’mon, Henry. You have shiny hair and dimples and I dress like Aileen Wuornos.” She paused to take a breath as she climbed. “The cops will believe you. Have you never broken a law before?”

“I’ve jaywalked once or twice in my time.”

“So badass.”

“And I’ve been involved in at least three incidences of underage drinking.”

With a final grunt and wince of pain as she put weight on her bad leg, Grace straddled the top of the fence. She’d done this before. “Henry.”

“I really want to go to college.”

“Climb the fence.”

“You know I’ve made it through seventeen years of my life without being peer pressured? My parents warned me about it in elementary school, but I never experienced it. I was starting to believe it was a myth.”

“Henry Page. Climb. The. Fence.”

“And, like, it’s a really accurate description of what it is. I’m feeling very pressured by my peer right now.”

“Henry, haul me that goddamn loaf of bread and then get your ass up here right now!”

“Fine!” I threw the bread over, then wrapped my hands around the iron bars and pulled myself up, which was difficult, because I could no longer feel my legs due to what I assumed was an impending panic attack. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God,” I said over and over again as I climbed. Grace disappeared on the other side of the hedge. “I’m going to be arrested. I’m never going to college. I’m going to be a felon. My parents are going to kill me.”

Once I reached the top of the iron bars, it became clear that there was no easy way to climb down the other side, so I kind of straddled the hedge and then rolled. It did not go well. I hit the ground, hard, lost my balance, and ended up on my knees. Grace’s cold laugh could only accurately be described as a cackle, this kind of raucous clucking more befitting of a crow than a human being.

“You sound like a Disney villain,” I said as I stood and brushed the dirt from my clothes, which only made Grace cackle more.