to walk until you canât hear any cars at all, and thatâs what I do. I walk and walk until all I can hear are the little cracks and snaps of branches and the swish of the brook. I follow the brook to a place where thereâs a crumbling dry stone wall and a tall maple tree with a rusted-out sap bucket nailed just above head height. Thatâs my place. Thatâs where I stop. In the book
A Wrinkle in Time
, it says that time is like a big old rumpled blanket. What Iâd like is to be caught in one of those wrinkles. Tucked away. Hidden in a small tight fold.
Usually I put myself in the Middle Ages. Usually England. Sometimes I sing snatches of the
Requiem
to myself, even though I know the
Requiem
isnât medieval. And I look at everythingârocks, fallen leaves, dead treesâlike I have the power to read those things. Like my life depends on understanding exactly what the forest has to say.
I make sure I bring along an old Gunne Sax dress of Gretaâs from when she was twelve. Itâs way too small for me, so I have to wear a shirtunderneath and keep the buttons open at the back. It looks more like something out of
Little House on the Prairie
than anything medieval, but itâs the best I can do. And then thereâs my medieval boots. Anyone will tell you that shoes are the hardest part to get right. For the longest time I only had plain black Keds, which I would try hard not to look at, because they ruined the whole thing.
I got the boots, which are black suede with crisscross leather laces right up the front, at the medieval festival at the Cloisters with Finn. It was October, and Finn had already been painting the portrait for four months. This was the third time heâd taken me to the festival. The first time it was his idea, but the other two were mine. As soon as the leaves started to brown and curl, Iâd start pestering him about it.
âYouâre becoming a regular medievalist, Crocodile,â heâd say. âWhat have I done to you?â
He was right. It was his fault. Medieval art was Finnâs favorite, and over the years weâd spent hours and hours looking through his books together. This third time at the festival, Finn was already getting thin. It was chilly enough for wool sweaters and Finn was wearing two, one on top of the other. We were drinking hot mulled cider, and it was just the two of us, alone with the greasy smell of a pig roasting on a spit and lute music and the whinny of a horse about to go into a fake joust and the jangling of a falconerâs bells. Finn saw the boots that day and bought them for me because he knew Iâd love them. He stayed with me at that bootmakerâs stall, tying up rough leather laces for me again and again like there was nothing heâd rather be doing. If they werenât right, heâd help pull the boots off my feet. Sometimes his hand would brush my ankle or my bare knee and Iâd blush. I didnât tell him this, but I made sure to choose a pair two sizes too big. I didnât care how many pairs of socks Iâd have to wear with them. I never wanted to grow out of those boots.
If I had a lot of money, I would buy acres of woods. I would put a wall around them and live there like it was another time. Maybe I would find one other person to live with me there. Someone who was willing to promise theyâd never speak a word about anything in thepresent. I doubt I could find anyone like that. Iâve never met anyone yet who might make that kind of promise.
Thereâs only one person Iâve ever told about what I do in the woods, and thatâs Finn, and I didnât even mean to tell him. We were walking back to his apartment from the movie theater after seeing
A Room with a View
. Finn started talking about how all the characters were so enchanting because they were so tightly wrapped and it was so beautiful to watch them try to unwrap one another. So romantic, he said. He