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I think he h, and when I open my eyes I see his face is totally composed

"You’re not serious," I say, but already a deep well of fear has opened inside of me and I know that he is

Soe all day: He o if you want to" He looks at o tomorrow After your shift"

"But hoould we--" I start to say He cuts me off

"Leave that to me" For a moment his eyes look deeper and darker than I’ve ever seen the to talk about it so casually, lying on the blanket, so I sit up Crossing the border is a capital offense, punishable by death And even though I know that Alex still does it sometimes, the enormity of the risk hasn’t really hit me until now "There’s no way," I say, aluards--and the guns"

"I told you Leave that to me" He sits up too, reaches out and cups ’s possible, Lena," he says, one of his favorite expressions The fear recedes I feel so safe with hiether "A few hours," he says "Just to see"

I look away "I don’t know" My throat feels parched; the words tear at ivesdeal," he says, throwing one arht you ht be curious, that’s all"

"I am curious But"

"Lena, it’s fine if you don’t want to go Seriously It was just an idea"

I nod Even thoughthem to my chest I feel incredibly relieved but also disappointed I have a sudden memory of the time Rachel dared me to do a back dive off the pier at Willard Beach and I stood tree, too scared to ju down to whisper, "It’s okay, Lena-Loo You’re not ready" All I’d wanted was to get away froe of the pier, but as alked back onto the beach I felt sick and ashao," I burst out

Alex removes his arm "For real?"

I nod, too afraid to say the words again I’m worried if I open my mouth I’ll take it back

Alex sits up slowly I thought he’d be more excited, but he doesn’t smile He just chews on the inside of his lip and looks away "Ita lot of rules"

He looks atache deep inside of es the pile oftheood idea If we get caught--I ht--" He sucks in a deep breath "I ive myself"

"I trust you," I say, and mean it 150 percent

He still won’t look atover" He takes another deep breath "The penalty for crossing over is" At the last second he can’t say death

"Hey" I nudge hi, how you can feel so taken care of by so just for the chance to protect hier than you have"

He cracks a ses me back "Hardly"

"Born and raised You’re a transplant" I nudge hihs and tries to catch hold of , and he stretches out to tickle rabs out and wrestles

"City slicker," he says, rolling over on top ofdissolves: heat, explosions of color, floating

We agree to , a Wednesday; since I won’t be working again until Saturday, it should be relatively easy to get Carol to allow h so over isn’t iuess the whole punishable-by-death thing isn’t really a big attraction

I don’t see hoe’ll ever make it past the electrified fence, but Alex explains that only certain portions of it are actually electrified Puh miles and miles of fence is too expensive, so relatively few stretches of the fence are actually "online": the reerous than the one that encircles the playground at Deering Oaks Park