said he wished things were like that now. I wanted him to know I understoodâthat I would do anything to go back in timeâso I told him about the woods. He laughed and bumped his shoulder against mine and called me a nerdatroid and I called him a geek for spending all his time thinking about painting, and then we both laughed because we knew we were right. We both knew we were the biggest nerds in the whole world. Now that Finnâs gone, nobody knows that I go to the woods after school. Sometimes I think nobody even remembers those woods exist at all.
Three
The portrait was never given to us. Not officially. Not with words.
Thatâs because it was never finished. Thatâs what Finn said. We had to keep going back for just one more sitting and one more sitting after that. Nobody argued about it except Greta, who stopped going to Finnâs on Sundays. She said if Finn was only doing the background, he didnât need all of us there. She said she had other things, better things, she could be doing with her Sunday afternoons.
It was a cold cold morning in January, the first day back to school after Christmas vacation, and we were waiting outside our house for the school bus. Our house is on Phelps Street, which is one of the last streets on the bus route. We live on the south end of town, and school is a little way out of town on the north side. By road itâs about two miles, but if you cut through backyards and come in through the woodsâwhich I sometimes doâitâs much less.
Because our house is one of the last the bus gets to, itâs always hard to know exactly when it will show up. Over the years, Greta and I have spent a lot of time out there waiting, staring down the line of front lawns on our street. Phelps has a mix of capes and ranches, except for the Millersâ Tudor, which sits up a small hill on the cul-de-sac. Itâs obviously a fake Tudor, because there was nobody in Westchester except for the Mohegan Indians in Tudor times, so I donât know who the Millers think theyâre fooling. Probably no one. Probably it never even crossed the Millersâ minds. But it crosses mine. Every single time I seeit. Ours is the light blue cape with black shutters and a sprawling red maple out front.
That morning I was jogging in place to stay warm. Greta was leaning against the maple, studying a pair of new suede ankle boots she had on. She kept taking her glasses on and off, breathing on them, then cleaning off the steam.
âGreta?â
âWhat?â
âWhat better things do you do on Sundays?â
I wasnât sure I really wanted to know. I wrapped my arms around my coat, pulling it in tighter.
Greta turned her head slowly and gave me a big close-lipped smile. She shook her head and widened her eyes.
âThings
you
canât even imagine.â
âYeah, right,â I said.
Greta went to stand on the other side of the driveway.
I figured she meant having sex. But, then again, maybe not, because I could imagine that. I didnât want to, but I could.
She took her glasses off again and turned the lenses white with her breath.
âHey,â I called over to her. âWeâre orphans again. Itâs orphan season.â
Greta knew what I meant. She knew I meant tax-season orphans. Every year it was the same. Thereâd be the buzz of Christmas and New Year, and then our parents disappeared for all the worst months of winter. Theyâd leave the house by six-thirty in the morning, and most nights they wouldnât be back until at least seven. Thatâs what itâs like to be the offspring of two accountants. Thatâs how itâs been for as long as I can remember.
In tax season, when our parents had to leave before the bus came, they used to have Mrs. Schegner across the street watch over us from her living room window. Nine-year-old Greta would stand waiting for the bus with seven-year-old me. Even though we knew Mrs.