Kalisha looked surprised, then laughed. It was a big one, which she delivered with her hands on her hips and her head thrown back. It made her look like a woman instead of a kid. “Interpersonal relationships! You got some mouth on you, Lukey!”

“Intra, not inter,” he said. “Unless you’re, like, meeting with a whole group. Giving them credit counseling, or something.” He paused. “That’s, um, a joke.” And a lame one at that. A nerd joke.

She regarded him appraisingly, up and down and then up again, producing another of those not unpleasant tingles. “Just how smart are you?”

He shrugged, a bit embarrassed. He ordinarily didn’t show off—it was the worst way in the world to win friends and influence people—but he was upset, confused, worried, and (might as well admit it) scared shitless. It was getting harder and harder not to label this experience with the word kidnapping. He was a kid, after all, he had been napping, and if Kalisha was telling the truth, he had awakened thousands of miles from his home. Would his parents have let him go without an argument, or an actual fight? Unlikely. Whatever had happened to him, he hoped they had stayed asleep while it was going on.

“Pretty goddam smart, would be my guess. Are you TP or TK? I’m thinking TK.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Except maybe he did. He thought of the way the plates sometimes rattled in the cupboards, how his bedroom door would sometimes open or close on its own, and how the pan had jittered at Rocket Pizza. Also the way the trashcan had moved by itself the day of the SAT test.

“TP is telepathy. TK is—”

“Telekinesis.”

She smiled and pointed a finger at him. “You really are a smart kid. Telekinesis, right. You’re either one or the other, supposedly no one’s both—that’s what the techs say, at least. I’m a TP.” She said this last with some pride.

“You read minds,” Luke said. “Sure. Every day and twice on Sunday.”

“How do you think I know about Maureen? She’d never tell anyone here about her probs, she’s not that kind of person. And I don’t know any of the details, just the general outline.” She considered. “There’s something about a baby, too. Which is weird. I asked her once if she had kids, and she said she didn’t.”

Kalisha shrugged.

“I’ve always been able to do it—off and on, not all the time—but it ain’t like being a superhero. If it was, I’d bust out of here.”

“You’re serious about this?”

“Yes, and here’s your first test. First of many. I’m thinking of a number between one and fifty. What’s my number?”

“No idea.”

“True? Not faking?”

“Absolutely not faking.” He walked to the door on the far side of the room. Outside, the boy was shooting hoops and the girl was bouncing on a trampoline—nothing fancy, just seat-drops and the occasional twist. Neither of them looked like they were having a good time; they looked like they were just passing time. “Those kids are George and Iris?”

“Yup.” She joined him. “George Iles and Iris Stanhope. They’re both TKs. TPs are rarer. Hey, smart kid, is that a word, or do you say more rare?”

“Either is okay, but I’d go with more rare. Rarer sounds like you’re trying to start an outboard motor.”

She thought this over for a few seconds, then laughed and pointed that finger at him again. “Good one.”

“Can we go out?”

“Sure. Playground door is never locked. Not that you’ll want to stay long, the bugs are pretty fierce out here in the boondocks. There’ll be Deet in your bathroom medicine cabinet. You should use it, and I mean really slather it on. Maureen says the bug situation will get better once the dragonflies hatch out, but I haven’t seen any yet.”

“Are they nice kids?”

“George and Iris? Sure, I guess so. I mean, it’s not like we’re besties, or anything. I’ve only known George for a week. Iris got here . . . mmm . . . ten days ago, I think. About that, anyway. After me, Nick’s been here the longest. Nick Wilholm. Don’t look forward to meaningful relationships in Front Half, smart kid. Like I said, they come and go. And don’t any of them talk of Michelangelo.”

“How long have you been here, Kalisha?”

“Almost a month. I’m an old-timer.”

“Then will you tell me what’s going on?” He nodded to the kids outside. “Will they?”

“We’ll tell you what we know, and what the orderlies and techs tell us, but I got an idea that most of it’s lies. George feels the same. Iris, now . . .” Kalisha laughed. “She’s like Agent Mulder on that X-Files show. She wants to believe.”

“Believe what?”

The look she gave him—both wise and sad—again made her look more like a grownup than a kid. “That this is just a little detour on the great highway of life, and everything’s going to come out all right in the end, like on Scooby-Doo.”

“Where are your folks? How did you get here?”

The adult look disappeared. “Don’t want to talk about that stuff now.”

“Okay.” Maybe he didn’t want to, either. At least not quite yet.

“And when you meet Nicky, don’t worry if he goes off on a rant. It’s how he blows off steam, and some of his rants are . . .” She considered. “Entertaining.”

“If you say so. Will you do me a favor?”

“Sure, if I can.”

“Stop calling me smart kid. My name is Luke. Use it, okay?”

“I can do that.”

He reached for the door, but she put her hand on his wrist.

“One more thing before we go out. Turn around, Luke.”

He did. She was maybe an inch taller. He didn’t know she was going to kiss him until she did it, a full-on lip-lock. She even put her tongue between his lips for a second or two, and that produced not just a tingle but a full-on jolt, like sticking a finger in a live socket. His first real kiss, and a wildersmooch for sure. Rolf, he thought (so far as he could think in the immediate aftermath), would be so jealous.

She pulled away, looking satisfied. “It’s not true love or anything, don’t get that idea. I’m not sure it’s even a favor, but it might be. I was in quarantine the first week I was here. No shots for dots.”

She pointed to a poster on the wall next to the candy machine. It showed a boy in a chair, pointing joyously at a bunch of colored dots on a white wall. A smiling doctor (white coat, stethoscope around his neck) was standing with a hand on the boy’s shoulder. Above the picture it said SHOTS FOR DOTS! And below: THE QUICKER YOU SEE EM, THE QUICKER YOU’RE BACK HOME!

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Never mind right now. My folks were full-on anti-vaxxers, and two days after I landed in Front Half, I came down with chicken pox. Cough, high fever, big ugly red spots, the whole nine yards. I guess I’m over it, since I’m out and about and they’re testing me again, but maybe I’m still a little bit contagious. If you’re lucky, you’ll get the pox and spend a couple of weeks drinking juice and watching TV instead of getting needles and MRIs.”

The girl spotted them and waved. Kalisha waved back, and before Luke could say anything else, she pushed open the door. “Come on. Wipe that dopey look off your face and meet the Fockers.”

SHOTS FOR DOTS

1

Outside the door of the Institute’s canteen and TV lounge area, Kalisha put an arm around Luke’s shoulders and pulled him close to her. He thought—hoped, really—she meant to kiss him again, but she whispered in his ear instead. Her lips tickled his skin and gave him goosebumps. “Talk about anything you want, only don’t say anything about Maureen, okay? We think they only listen sometimes, but it’s better to be careful. I don’t want to get her in trouble.”

Maureen, okay, the housekeeping lady, but who were they? Luke had never felt so lost, not even as a four-year-old, when he had gotten separated from his mother for fifteen endless minutes in the Mall of America.

Meanwhile, just as Kalisha had predicted, the bugs found him. Little black ones that circled his head in clouds.