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Bostwick stood at the front of the classroom giving his impassioned recitation, I could do little more than rest my fevered brow on my hands and quietly wish to die.
    At noon, I begged Mr. Teague to dismiss me to go home. He touched his own fat hand to my face and, satisfied with its temperature, released me with instructions to read the next twenty pages in our history text. I didn’t even bring the book home. Instead, I launched myself down the path, my lunch pail dangling from listless fingers. Befuddled as my mind was, I couldn’t help but hear Nathan’s words with every step. This is where he talked about children. This is where he spoke of persecution. And of a prophet. A new prophet.
    Seemed we had new preachers in our church all the time. Men in the midst of a journey, stopping for a week or so to thunder out the promise of a fiery eternity in hell for the condemned. But there was no such fire in Nathan’s voice. Only warmth. Nothing called down from heaven, but some kind of inner ember. I touched my cheek where he’d touched me, fascinated by the heat there. But of course, that was due to my cold. At least partly.
    Soon I was at the place where he met me. I lingered there, wondering if, by some chance, he might return. Might be waiting for me, even. But of course he wasn’t. I staggered onto our property and braced myself against the stones of my father’s wall as a wave of dizziness caught me. For a moment, everything was lost. Twirled around and ripped away. I could only hear my mother’s voice coming closer, shaking with the impact of her running footfalls. Then she was here, one arm wrapped around my waist. Her cool palm on my forehead.
    “Oh, Mama. I’m sick.”
    And safely home, I closed my eyes.

Chapter 4
    I slept the rest of that day and through the night, my dreams peppered with images of Nathan Fox, my body trembling with unrelenting chills. The next morning I made a halfhearted attempt to rouse myself for school, but Mama would have none of it.
    “You’re still burning with fever.” Her soft voice seemed to come from far away as she touched a cool rag to my face.
    My throat felt too swollen and sore to reply. The simple nodding of my head proved painful. Nestling deep into the mattress, I pulled the blanket up to my nose and closed my eyes. No doubt Mama thought I was sleeping. She said a few soothing words before going downstairs to make me a cup of tea. Listless and lethargic as I felt, though, sleep would not come. My wakefulness allowed me to craft new dreams of Nathan. When I slept, he was always just out of reach. I’d see him on the path, but every step I took drove him one more step away. But in these waking hours, I could control him—make him stop and wait. Turn to me and reach out. I could intertwine my fingers in his, have him pull me close. My visions were clear, if fevered, but incomplete. I didn’t know what a boy would do once a girl was in his arms. And Nathan was more than a boy. He was a man. I knew even less of that.
    It was quite early in the morning. My father’s voice still rumbled in the kitchen. If I were going to school, it would be at least an hour before that appointed time. I heard the kettle rattle on the stove and imagined Nathan sitting next to a nearby fire. My own stomach growled for lack of food, and I wondered if he had eaten yet. My mind etched his face, down to the crease at the corner of his mouth when he smiled, and I burned to see it again in flesh before me. Would he be waiting again at the path? Would he worry when I didn’t arrive? The thought of it made me want to swing my feet over the side of the bed. Put on my dress and shoes and somehow find the strength to leave this house. But my body groaned at the slightest stirring, and my mother’s appearance at the door bearing a tray of steaming grits and weak tea stifled the very notion.
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    I awoke later to a broken fever and a high noon sun. Like someone washed up by some sort of tide, I