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of shelter.
    At the edge of a muddy, cracked parking lot, she saw a small hole in a thatch of blackberry bushes. She ducked into the hole and crawled deeper in, feeling the thorns catching at her hoodie. Whatever animal had created this tunnel used it often, for it widened the further she went.
    When she emerged on the other side, it was as if she had found a fairyland. It took her a few moments to realize she hadn’t accidentally entered someone’s house. Except for the fire pit at the center of the clearing, it looked like a shabby but genteel living room. She looked up and saw planks and tarps. The walls consisted of branches woven so thickly that they looked solid, and the floor was a mishmash of carpet pieces. It felt comfy, warm, and inviting. It was both dry and out of the sunlight. Jamie immediately relaxed.
    Then she noticed the three men sitting comfortably in chairs on the other side of the “room.”
    “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t know anyone was here.”
    “No one is,” the eldest of the trio laughed. “We don’t exist. This is the land of the forgotten.”
    She didn’t know what to say. The men didn’t seem alarmed, just curious. They were rough looking, bearded and longhaired, with tattered clothes, but Jamie had developed a sixth sense for how threatening men were, and she felt nothing but goodwill from this bunch.
    “Sit down, make yourself comfortable,” the old man said. “I’m Billy. This scrawny fellow is Cam, and the guy who can’t stop staring at you is Patrick.”
    “I’m Jamie,” she said. She almost felt like curtsying, and she had a memory of introducing herself to her first-grade teacher.
    Billy got up from his wicker chair and motioned her into it. He went over to one side of the enclosure, where there was a small table laden with plates and cups. He poured some coffee into one of the cups and handed it to her.
    “Welcome, Jamie,” he said. He sat down at her feet companionably.
    She waited for them to ask why she was there, but they continued a conversation they had apparently been having before she arrived, about whether LeBron James was as good a basketball player as he thought he was and whether Jordan could’ve taken him apart.
    She found herself nodding off. Here, among three strange men, she felt the safest she’d felt since she’d been Turned.
     
    #
     
    The next morning, they fed her some scrambled eggs and bread toasted on an open fire. Jamie had found that she could eat human food, but didn’t really need it as long as her bloodthirst was satisfied. She ate the breakfast politely, but turned down seconds.
    When she was done, Billy got up. “Come with me,” he said, and started crawling out of the tunnel. Jamie looked through the small gaps in the walls of branches and tried to ascertain whether the sun was shining. She couldn’t tell. She trusted in fate and followed the old man out.
    It was a typical Crescent City day: overcast, drizzling a slight rain that you almost couldn’t feel but that would eventually soak you to the bone if you didn’t seek shelter.
    The old man took her to a thrift shop a few hundred yards away from their hideaway. He introduced her to the manager, Marc, who let her come in and pick out a wardrobe of warm clothes. She filled a garbage bag with clothing items.
    Then Billy took her about half a mile down the road, onto a side street that was rarely traveled by cars. A soup kitchen had been set up, and men, women, and children were seated at picnic tables, being served a warm meal. The drizzle had stopped and the clouds were dispersing. The coastal winds would clear the sky of cloud cover by noon, and Jamie started getting anxious.
    As if he could sense her alarm, Billy led her back to his home.
    “Me and the boys are heading north for rest of the summer,” he said after they had crawled through the tunnel and were standing in the “living room” again. “We always wander up to Bend, Oregon, this time of year. But