Once they had finished the tour of the library, Josh led Tyler up the second flight of stairs to a large room, where the other children were already gathered. There were various rugs laid out all over the floor, and old couches and chairs along the walls, with a decent-sized coffee table in the middle. Underneath the only window, there was a small shelf, upon which a phonograph sat. Stacked neatly in the shelf was a number of vinyl records.

"Hey, Tyler, we were just about to play some music," Jenna greeted from her place on the floor next to the phonograph. Pete and Patrick were lounging on one of the couches, while the rest of the children sat on the floor. Sarah was picking some of the flowers that sprouted up where she sat and looked as if she were weaving them into something. A necklace, maybe. Tyler took a seat next to Sarah, while Josh sat in one of the chairs in the corner.

"How come you always get to play with the phonograph?" Brendon whined.

"Because I'm the oldest, and the most responsible," Jenna pointed out. "Tyler, do you want to pick out what we listen to? It's your first day here, after all," she added, plopping the heavy stack of records into his lap.

Curiously, Tyler began flipping through them. Most of them were by older musicians like Little Richard and The Beatles, but a few of them were newer. When Tyler's hand paused on one record, in particular, Brendon hopped up and down like a kid on a sugar high. "Frank Sinatra!"

Tyler looked briefly puzzled as the other children in the room groaned. Apparently, they'd all heard that record one too many times. Tyler kept looking.

Eventually, he settled on an album by Radiohead. He didn't really know the band, but he liked the name and some of the titles of the songs. Almost imperceptibly, Josh nodded his head slightly from the spot in the corner, as if he approved. Feeling strangely pleased, Tyler sat up straighter.

As Jenna put the record on, Sarah shyly held out what she'd been making--a flower necklace, as Tyler had thought. "It's for you," she said in a voice as soft and light as she was.

Tyler brightened and slipped the necklace over his neck carefully. "Thank you, it's beautiful." Sarah grinned in return, seeming to have warmed up to him a bit. 

"So, Tyler." Brendon was laying on the rug now, but he sat up slightly, putting his chin in his hands. He was definitely going to get rug burn on his elbows. "What's your story?"

"My story?" Tyler repeated.

"Yeah. Like, why are you here? What'd you do?"

Josh abruptly stood up and left the room. Save from Tyler, the other children pretended not to notice.

"Not everyone did something to get here," Jenna countered. "I didn't do anything, it was just freaking people out that I was--"

"A human light bulb?" Brendon offered. Jenna good-naturedly threw a pillow at him.

"I accidentally summoned a cloud of starlings at school," Tyler admitted, not wanting to go too far into details.

"That's it?" Brendon rolled over onto his back. "Ugh. Boring. I got caught mimicking a teacher perfectly in...I think fifth grade?" He glanced at Ryan, then down to the rugs again. "You can only hide yourself for so long, I guess."

As the Radiohead album droned on, Tyler glanced briefly to the door, and wondered how long Josh had been doing just that.