A Face at the Fence
You duck behind the water trough. The something at the fence is not a wolf. It is worse, in a completely different way.
It is Finn from the next farm over — nine years old, hair like an escaped haystack, carrying the homemade notebook he calls his Encyclopedia of Monsters and Interesting Animals, Volume 3. He is standing on the bottom rail, staring at the giant pumpkins with his mouth open.
“Madison,” he says, without even looking at you, which means he knew where you were hiding, which is annoying, “your pumpkins are the size of my dad's car. Doris the hen is worshipping your barn. And Tuesday night I heard hoofbeats in your orchard, except they went ring-ring-ring like my mum's bicycle bell.” He flips the encyclopedia open to a fresh page, pencil ready. His eyes are enormous. “I've narrowed it down to seventeen possibilities.”
From the cellar window behind you — muffled, silvery, unmistakable — comes a sneeze.
Finn's pencil freezes. Slowly, like a haystack turning to face destiny, he looks at the cellar window, then at you.