Walking home. Kyle and Jack walked home together every day with Kyle's friend Matt, and sometimes Kyle's friend David.

Matt: perfectly-combed black hair, deep eyes, four older brothers, excellent bass guitar player. David: tan as a camel, sandy yellow hair, hands that were constantly tapping a pencil or crinkling paper. Both of them were popular with their classmates, although David was often called Kyle and Matt's "sidekick" because he was shorter and chubbier than them. Both were also friendly—to Kyle. Neither really talked to Jack, who usually found himself walking several feet behind them.

Kyle, Matt, and David laughed and joked between themselves as they sauntered down the sidewalk, going on about a girl in their class, a girl in the seventh-grade class, and a new movie that was out. They debated whether they'd be able to see it; it was rated PG-13, and David hadn't turned thirteen yet. David threw a stick at a cat, Kyle picked up a Sacagawea coin off the sidewalk, Matt stopped to check out a new spoiler on his neighbor's car. Then both Kyle's friends made off to their own houses, and it was the two brothers by themselves. They lived a bit farther than most of their classmates, because their parents had wanted a big backyard. Being on the edge of town gave them a nice big field at the back of the house.

Kyle slowed down so Jack could catch up. They walked in silence for a few minutes, and then Kyle asked, "Why do you let people say stuff about you?"

Blinking out of his thoughts about the day, Jack shrugged. "I just don't care if they do."

"You're lying."

"No I'm not."

"You do care, Jack. I know it, because you always get all touchy when I ask you about it."

The quieter boy sniffed, more to make noise than out of sadness. "Sometimes I care. Sometimes all the words come at me at once. I remember them all together, and then it sort of bothers me. But in class . . . I don't really hear it so much as you do."

"Yeah?" said Kyle, annoyance in his voice. "Well that's because you don't listen. You don't ever pay enough attention to hear them. But I hear it all the time. Do you think I like people making fun of my brother? I don't, you know? But I'm not going to make them stop. That's what you should do. I'm not your mom or something."

"You don't have to make them stop."

"So . . . what? I'm supposed to just sit there and let them talk?"

Jack put his thumbs under the straps of his book-bag and pulled at them. "You do anyway. Really, Kyle. I don't care what they say. They don't talk about you, so why are you worried about it?"

"Because we've been in this school for eight years. We look exactly the same. You're my brother. Why should one of us be made fun of and one of us fit in? That doesn't make a lot of sense. And I want to know what you're always thinking about. It's not fair that you always get to have your brain on other stuff and I'm stuck thinking about work and soccer games. If you have all this cool stuff in your head, why can't you tell me what it is?" Kyle stopped walking, reached out a hand and took hold of his brother's arm to stop him, too.

Jack's head slumped to one side. His features were perplexed. "It's . . . it's not that I have cool stuff in my head. It's not . . . well . . . I'm not different than you, except . . . oh forget it, Kyle. Every time I try to explain, you don't get it."

"I'll try to get it. Jeff thinks you're mental, but I know you aren't. Just trust me."

"It doesn't have anything to do with trust," Jack replied, staring down at the sidewalk. "There are just things that I don't think anybody else notices. Things that nobody ever seems to see or hear except for me. I don't know why."

For a minute, Kyle didn't say anything. He watched his brother stub his shoe at a patch of grass growing through a crack in the cement. Then he said quietly, "That's what you say every time I ask."

Jack frowned. "Yeah, it's the truth. What do you want me to say?"

"I don't know, Jack. I don't know. Something somebody besides you could understand."

Kyle turned and went on down the sidewalk. Jack stared at his back for just a second before running to catch up to his brother. "Hey! I saw your paper—the one you turned in for Mrs. Adams about the planets."

"Yeah?" Kyle beamed, having already forgotten the disappointment he'd just felt over his twin's vagueness. He knew he'd done great on that paper. "I didn't know she was going to put them out in the hall."

"Your pictures were really good. Did Mr. Patrick see them? He'd probably like too, him being an art teacher and everything."

The sun was strong on the boys' backs. The sky was blue over their heads. It was late September, and the weather was beginning to quickly cool off as the days slipped closer toward the winter months. At night, the air was chilly and moist. During the days, most people layered their clothing; the mornings could be cold, but the afternoons were warm enough to go jacket-less. The temperature often fluctuated with the passing hours, depending on whether clouds were out or winds picked up. Heat moved on the breezes. Chills rippled through the grass. That was why it was good to always have a windbreaker handy.

Both Kyle and Jack were pulling their jackets on as they drew near their home. They approached it from the side, which they did whenever they walked David to his house. Jack didn't like walking that way. He liked going in through the front door. There was something about the large, unkempt field in their backyard that always made him colder. Kyle noticed that, too, although he blamed it on the openness of the field. He said that the wind moved faster across it. His twin didn't agree.

Ever since they'd moved into their house, Jack had sensed something in that field. Not necessarily something bad or good—just something. Something that he almost felt was trying to tell him he didn't belong in it. He rarely went into that five-acre plot of land unless it was covered in snow and Kyle coerced him into building an igloo or rolling a snowman. Right now, the grass was high and straw-colored. The numerous trees that were along the edges of it were losing their leaves. Jack and Kyle's father had tried to build them a treehouse in one of those trees, once. It was a while ago, when they were in fourth grade. But the boards had never been able to stay nailed into the trunk of the tree. They'd kept getting loose and falling out.

"Hurry up," said Jack. "I don't like coming through the field."

"I know. Me neither. It's always kind of cold back here. We're not too far, though." Kyle pulled his windbreaker tighter around himself. The boys could see their house, about half a football-field's length away. "I keep wanting Dad to mow down this grass. It'd make a great soccer field out here. Or we could set up a baseball diamond, with bases and everything. And then you wouldn't be so scared to walk in it."

"You're scared to walk in it, too!"

"Yeah, barefoot." Kyle laughed. "Ok. It does kind of freak me out. There're probably snakes and rats in here. I mean, we can't even see what we're stepping on; the stupid weeds are so high. Seriously, we have got to stop walking David home. We're always stuck coming this way."

Jack smiled. "You know what, though? If we're stepping on things, it's worse for them than it is for us."

"True," Kyle agreed.

"Even if we stepped on a snake, it can't bite us. We're wearing pants. And—" Jack stopped moving. Stood dead still where he was, about one hundred feet from his house.

When Kyle realized his brother wasn't walking at his side anymore, he looked back. A strange expression crossed Jack's face. Like he was listening for something bizarre. As if he had picked up on the scent of an animal. Kyle felt strange inside. "What's the matter?"

It took Jack a moment to respond. His eyes still not focusing on Kyle, he said, "Do you feel that?"

"Feel what?"

"The ground . . . like . . . like it's moving. Not moving a lot, but just a little."

A wind picked up around the boys, swishing the grass around their legs. Kyle's arms prickled with goosebumps. "No. Come on, Jack. Let's get inside. It's getting cold." His words mingled with the wind.

Jack stayed where he was. He didn't really hear what his brother had said.

Kyle waited a bit longer, then grew irritated. He walked back to Jack. "What are you talking about?"

"It just feels . . . weird. Kind of weird under your feet. Almost like it's not solid ground." Like things are whispering underneath the earth, Jack wanted to add. But he didn't tell people thoughts like that. He'd learned a long time ago to keep those sorts of ideas to himself.

"A bad weird?" asked Kyle. "Or a good weird?"

Jack thought. "I'm not sure."

"Then who cares? I don't feel anything. It's not like we get many earthquakes up here, so I think you're just imagining it." Kyle stood, his eyes still on his identical brother. He was waiting for Jack to wake up and continue walking. He rubbed his nose and pulled at the longish, dark hair hanging over his ears. "Come on, already. I want to get my stupid homework done so I can watch Doom Tribe. I think Mom's making lasagna tonight, too. I'm about to leave you here if you don't hurry up."

That was the last thing Jack wanted. He never went into the field alone. Besides, the movement had stopped. It wasn't there anymore. Nothing was there but the wind, the grass, and his brother. "All right. I'm coming. I need to do my homework, too."

The trees moved silently in the dying wind as the boys walked toward their house. They watched the two between the ridges in their bark, feeling the movement in their roots, which dug deep into the soil. There was something rhythmic pulsing in the underground, beating slowly, deeply, like an aboriginal drum. Strange things dwelt in deep places, the trees knew. Jack Kemper would come to know it, too, whether he was ready or not.