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and was jamming them back inside when a little voice
    squeaked, “What’s the password?”
    She started and scanned her immediate surroundings. Saw no
    one. She must have been tireder than she realized if she was having auditory hallucinations.
    “Password,” the childlike voice demanded again.
    It was coming from the fragrant, fl owering bushes behind her.
    She leaned over the back of the bench and peered down into the
    shrubbery.
    A glitter-dusted face stared up at her. Big brown eyes, pinch-
    able cheeks, and a tangle of wild dark hair, crowned with a wreath
    of fl owers and ribbon completed the picture. Aroostine took in
    the fairy wings strapped to the girl’s back and the wand she waved
    regally in her right hand.
    “Pixie dust?” she ventured.
    Th e girl shook her head solemnly. “Sorry.”
    “Magic?”
    “Nope. You get one more try.”
    Aroostine considered her next guess.
    “Love?”
    Th e fairy girl popped to her feet.
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    CHILLING EFFECT
    “Close. But it’s moon glow.”
    “Of course,” Aroostine said. She tried to keep a straight face,
    but the girl was so adorable it was ridiculous.
    Th e girl appraised her.
    “I’ve never seen you before.”
    “No, you haven’t,” Aroostine agreed.
    “I know. I know everybody who lives on the reservation. And
    the tourists are usually . . . white. Where do you live?”
    “I’m from Pennsylvania. It’s pretty far away.”
    “I know. It’s near New York, right?” the girl said proudly.
    “Yep.”
    “You’re Native, though. Like me,” the girl observed.
    “Right again. My name’s Aroostine.” She smiled at the girl.
    “I’m Lily.” Th e girl stuck out her free hand and Aroostine took
    her small palm in her hand and gave it a shake.
    “It’s nice to meet you, Lily.”
    “Th anks. My name’s a fl ower. My mom’s is a jewel. What does
    yours mean?”
    “It means sparkling water.”
    “Th at’s pretty.”
    “So is Lily,” she told the girl. Th en she asked, “What are you
    doing in the bushes? Looking for fairy houses?”
    Th e girl shook her head. Her eyes were big and serious. “Wait-
    ing for my mom. She works inside.”
    Aroostine tried to keep her judgment off her face. Maybe child-
    care was hard to come by on the reservation, but surely there was
    a safer place for the girl to spend her time than crouching in the
    bushes outside the casino.
    “Do you always wait for her out here?”
    Th e girl answered with a quick shake of her head, tossing her hair over her face. “Oh, no. Usually I stay at our place. I do my homework 35
    MELISSA F. MILLER
    and get ready for bed. Mom works pretty late some nights. Most of
    the time we have dinner together and then I see her in the morning.”
    Latchkey kid.
    Aroostine fl ashed back to a very long time ago, before the Hig-
    ginses adopted her. A memory of warming a plate her grandfather
    had left for her in the oven while he was at a tribal council meeting.
    Eating alone and crawling into bed and listening to the wind blow
    outside the window. She blinked away the memory.
    “So what are you doing out here, then?” she asked.
    “Mom said it isn’t safe to be home alone tonight.”
    News of the murder must be making the rounds, if the girl’s
    mother thought she was safer hanging around the casino than
    tucked in her bed.
    Headlights arced over her, and then Joe slowed the maroon Jeep
    to a stop near the bench.
    “Well, I have to go, Lily. It was nice to meet you.”
    “Good-bye, Aroostine. Have fun in Pennsylvania.”
    Th e way the girl said “Pennsylvania,” as if it were the most glamorous location imaginable, made Aroostine’s heart squeeze in her chest.
    She turned as she slid into the passenger side of the car and said,
    “Moon glow.”
    She could hear the girl’s excited giggling as she closed the door.
    Th ey drove in companionable silence for several minutes, wind-
    ing their way down the lushly landscaped hills that separated the
    resort from the rest of the reservation.