I'm 13 years old. I stole my pop's old truck, and now I'm driving to see Uncle Tomás. I didn't plan for Ben to come along. And I didn't plan to run out of gas.

"'Why don't you put some lead in your foot?'" Ben says, his voice high and mocking. He walks behind me, hands shoved in his pockets. "'We're not gonna get there until the '40s, how slow you're driving.'"

"Can it," I snap. "And my voice is deeper than that."

"A big ant is still a little bug," Ben says. He kicks a rock off the highway.

We are somewhere far south of home on Route 51. I lug a gas can. It's my turn since Ben carried it the last mile.

"Think there's a gas station up there?" I ask. Ben doesn't respond. I stop trudging. I look up from the ground, squint against the bright light, look at him, then look at what transfixed him.

"Assumption," Ben says. "Like at mass."

"Weird name for a town," I reply. The town sign is blurry, but I can still read it, for the most part. It's bright.

"Who's that?" Ben says. He points just beyond the sign.

A silhouette wavers, like heat low over the road, only it isn't hot enough for that. The figure swaggers toward us, limping, then not. Dread nausea swirls like sick in the back of my throat.

"Get behind me, Lou," Ben says. He shoves his hand into his pocket and draws his pocketknife. The blade catches the sun and flashes, and then he stops moving.

Cold air, like what I imagine the sky to taste like. Acrid coal. I feel a buzzing thing shoot through me—a sunburn from the inside out.

my name is garden and cradle and the mass by which all other bodies are measured and i am your mother
do not be afraid ask me a question before death hastens me from this moment
screaming is not a question dear one
ben will be fine you will not cause him insurmountable pain
one more question
no dear one i cannot blindless is your fate though you will see into the great beyond

"LOU OH GOD WAKE UP HOLY MOTHER WAKE UP." Ben slaps me, and I wake up screaming.

Ben pulls me into an embrace. I can feel his heart beating against mine. He clutches his pocketknife in a trembling fist, blade stabbing toward Assumption. One day, I'll understand that his fear was not of the thing we saw, but of what it could have done to me.

"Was that the Devil?" Ben whispers.

"It's all right, Ben," I say. "I don't think it was the Devil." We part. I don't think it was something holy either.

I think it was a third thing.