Before the sun had even risen over Snow Wood Boarding School, the general store just outside campus took in its first customer.

The attendant behind the counter stirred, grunting as he looked the boy over. He stamped on the crusty welcome mat for a few moments, but not quite long enough to shake the fresh powder of snow that was now glazing the linoleum floor.

The attendant frowned. Most of the other kids from the boarding school were creatures of habit. They swung by at the same time every morning or afternoon, bought the same flavor hog lumps, and chattered with the same mild-mannered boys as they came and went. If he turned his brain off, the faces of his customers would blur together. They were all perfectly pleasant, but the way they would gingerly count out the coins he handed back as change or their insistence on smoothing out even the tiniest wrinkle from their sports coats left a bitter taste in his mouth.

He'd first spotted the boy in the early hours of a Friday morning, just after the start of the autumn term. He came through the door by himself, looking smaller than ever as he took off his knit cap and approached the counter, asking if he could use the phone in the back.

The attendant blinked. "It's jus' roun' the corner there, mate. Cos' you a quid for the firs' five minutes."

The boy nodded, uttering something that was probably 'thanks', and shuffled towards the payphone.

The attendant watched the boy amble away. He wasn't even sure if the payphone had been used even once since it had been installed a few years ago. He was considering how long it took for phones to fall into disrepair from lack of use when he heard the boy whispering. The attendant hardly had time to eavesdrop before he heard the click of the receiver. The boy was already making his way to the door.

"D'you need anythin' else?" the attendant hollered as the boy reached for the handle.

The boy didn't stop before shaking his head and leaving.

He dropped in again a week and a half later. That time, he gave a small wave, but used the phone for an equally short stint. Before he left, he came by the counter and scooped a handful of Black Jacks onto the counter (ten pence each).

"I've never even seen any o' the other boys use the phone before," he said, depositing the sweets into a paper bag. "Why's tha'?"

The boy shrugged as he placed a pound in the attendant's outstretched hand. "They probably use the phone in the commons."

"Oh. How come you don' use tha' one as well? Seems awfully convenien' to 'ave a phone so close."

He shrugged again as he took the bag and left the store.

The piecemeal conversations the boy offered would likely have irritated most, but the work was so dull that the attendant started looking forward to his shifts just to see if he could coax a few more answers from the boy. He bought varying amounts of sweets each time he came, but he paid for them in exact coinage each and every time. Over three visits, the attendant learned he was in Year Eight, he'd had glasses since he was six, and he didn't even like Black Jacks.

"No' a big fan o' licorice?" the attendant asked as he rang up the order.

The boy shook his head. "Hate it. Friend of mine is the only person I know who loves it."

"You an' all your other friends take the mickey ou' o' him for tha'?"

The boy shrugged and let out a laugh as he paid for the sweets, then left without another word. The attendant was stunned, but as the door closed, a twinge of revulsion began to set in. He had no problem ribbing on the occasional customer, but it was hard to shake the feeling that he'd overstepped into something especially sensitive, considering the boy had defaulted to his indecipherable shrug.

Now that the boy was back for a sixth visit, the attendant struggled to shake the slightly awkward feeling that had settled. Nevertheless, the boy gave him the same wave as he came in, used the payphone, and scooped up another handful of licorice. The boy fumbled in his pockets for the change.

"Good thing it's Friday, eh?" the attendant inserted cautiously.

"I suppose so." His tone was flat.

The attendant ventured on. "You an' all the other kids probably spend so much time in the books tha' you hate weekends, huh?"

The boy frowned, still digging for the change. "I dunno, I kind of like them..."

"I'm only jokin', don' mind me."

The boy let out a small laugh. "Oh, well..."

The attendant passed the bag over the counter. "You ever go back home for the weekends?"

The boy took the bag, and for the first time, lingered on a response.

"Yeah, we're allowed to."

He left the store, and the attendant breathed a sigh of relief. He was so awash in having alleviated the tension it took another hour for him to realize the boy didn't actually answer the question.

If there was ever a place to be at noon on a cold Friday morning, it would probably be Snow Wood's central dining hall.

Huge windows on every side bathed the room in soft, natural light. There weren't any electric heaters, but the groundskeeper was always in the room by half past ten, coaxing the enormous fireplace with a poker and hearty firewood. A roaring flame was usually in place by eleven thirty, dousing the hall in yawn-inducing heat. Mahogany tables and chairs rested atop the varnished timber boards, giving the room a brilliant, natural earthy scent. Best of all, if you sat in the five odd tables closest to the kitchens, you got front row seats to the delicious smells of whatever the kitchen staff were cooking for lunchtime that day.

Jeff arrived at the hall at half past twelve, when most of the seats had already been filled. Classes finished right after lunch on Fridays, and the dining hall was filled with excited chattering that made his ears ring. As he moved along the lunch queue (steak and kidney pie, mash, carrots and peas on the side), he scanned the room for Tony's signature trilby. Coming up empty, he scampered for the first seat he could find.

A few of the boys at the table he settled on recognized him and nodded in his direction as he sat down, but most of them were deep in conversation. It was only the middle of October, but they were already chattering about events that seemed to him a lifetime away.

"Probably Summers for me," Percy from Dorm C announced through a mouthful of potatoes. "My dad thinks he's going to sail all the way to Scaraba on a rented yacht, the fool."

Laughter erupted from the boys as Jeff stabbed the pastry crust of his pie.

Percy continued. "It's all fine and dandy in my book as long as he doesn't lump me into things. I'm content to just muck around on the beach or the boardwalk, to be honest."

The boys nodded, as Michael (also Dorm C) sighed, his expression placid. "The beach sounds fantastic, honestly. It's looking like Mum's working all through Christmas, so I'll be in the apartment in Fourside."

"'Some apartment'," Jason from Dorm B snorted. "What a load of rubbish. We all know you'll be chumming it up with Mr. Monotoli from your little penthouse, probably flying around with him in his little yellow chopper."

The boys tittered as Michael grinned without much embarrassment.

"Yeah, yeah, alright," he said. "I was just taking the piss. I couldn't care less about Monotoli though, I used to see him every time I took the elevator during the summer. I'm more excited about seeing Ms. Venus Aimée at the Topolla, to be honest."

He dropped the last sentence without much drama, but the name was all it took to send the boys into a frenzy.

"What?!" Leonard from Dorm A exclaimed. "You've got to be joking!"

"What seats did you get?" Ralph from Dorm B demanded.

Having achieved the desired effect, Michael leaned back in his chair, his hands placed languidly behind his head.

"Oh you know," he said, his tone faux casual, "Front orchestra."

The boys went into another frenzy as they zoned in on Michael, now the shiniest toy on the table.

"Any chance you could take me?"

"Take a picture for us, won't you? I think I've got a Polaroid you can borrow..."

"You'll get her autograph, won't you? On anything! Anything will do!"

Jeff finished most of his pie before the fervor had died down.

Jason was the first to speak. "My dad hasn't even decided yet, but honestly, anywhere that's not here will do for me. I'm sick of all this bloody snow."

Percy nodded. His eyes flickered toward the silent corner of the table, as if he had just noticed the seat was filled.

"What about you, Jeff?"

"Huh?" Jeff replied. "I kind of like it..."

The boys snickered.

"No, not the snow," he said, his eyes crinkling in amusement. "Any plans over the Christmas break?"

"Oh, well, you know..." Jeff's voice trailed off. His mind drew a blank. A few of the boys stared with mild anticipation, while others were already exchanging barely disguised grins.

He settled on a shrug.

The table allowed the silence to grow for another beat before Jason turned again and asked another question about Venus's show - something about merchandise. Michael responded, and soon after, the table returned to its previously lively state. Conversation ramped up again without any evidence it had petered out in the first place.

Jeff stacked cutlery onto his tray and left the table. He braced himself for a tease or chuckle in his general direction, but the table was as rowdy as it had been when he first joined it.

Snowfall started early and ended late in Winters. The fields were caked in perpetual white by the beginning of October, but it never seemed to stop the boys at Snow Wood from weekly games of rugby out on Ingram Field. Despite constant insistence from the teachers that playing on such slippery terrain was an endlessly foolish endeavor, the boys soldiered on. They were so persistent that by the third week of term, many of the custodians simply gave up on shepherding them away from the snow-covered fields, instead opting to scrape the morning snowfall off the fields and hope the boys didn't run too fast. Each game ended in predictable fashion, regardless of who won: half of the participants would come away with bruises and soaked tracksuits.

That Friday's game was particularly brutish. From his dorm window, Jeff watched Leonard charge across the field, easily breaking twenty five meters without much resistance before Percy met him square in the midriff. The pair crashed onto the floor in unison. After they extricated themselves from each other, the two immediately began to quarrel.

Jeff didn't bother cracking the window open to get a proper ear on what they were arguing about. No doubt it was something trivial - probably the legality of the tackle. Whenever the rugby boys got into each other, Jeff usually found much more amusement watching the expressions of the rounders players that skulked around the rotunda by the sports shed. Jeff figured the last good game those guys got in was in mid-September, right before they were booted off the fields to make room for regular rugby practice sessions. Now, with the weather at an all time low, it was unlikely they would get to play another game until late Spring next year, just a few weeks before they would all have to leave for the summer holidays.

Other fields weren't an option either. The headmaster had sat them all down in the grand auditorium at the start of the term to tell them that almost all of the fields and thickets outside campus gates had been closed off until further notice. There were reports of feral animals, he had said, and it wasn't safe to mess about outside until they had news that there was absolutely no cause for concern. Trips into the Village were postponed indefinitely, but the headmaster gave the go ahead to the Tessie-Watching Club for one last camping trip.

The sportier types were enraged by this concession after they were all dismissed from the auditorium, but they got over it quickly once they found out rugby was fair game on Ingram Field.

The news about the animals was still fresh in Jeff's mind, but no one seemed to want to talk about it at a deeper length than mentioning the problem even existed. Tony listened to him from time to time, but his rounded face would get so flushed with concern that Jeff thought it better for his health to drop the subject.

When Tony came up to the dorm ten minutes later, he had to yank on Jeff's arm just to shake him out of his stupor.

"Are you alright?" Tony asked, eyes round with worry.

"I'm fine..." Jeff replied, rubbing his eyes. "When did you get up here? Where were you?"

"I was with Maxwell, helping him work on his thingy," Tony said.

"Thingy?" Jeff asked, sitting on the beanbag chair near the window.

"Haven't the foggiest what it actually is," Tony replied, sitting on the edge of his bed and dropping his bag to the floor. "I zoned out the first time he told me, and I'm too scared to ask him again. I just hand him whatever he needs, and nod whenever he asks me a question. My guess is it's got something to do with locks, since he's got about a hundred busted-looking padlocks and combos on his benches. Managed to sneak a bite of lunch just before the dining hall closed, though."

He pulled a little plastic box from the bag, revealing what would have been a pie if perhaps he had not shaken the container so much.

"Cool," Jeff said. The sight of the food brought him back rather unceremoniously to the dining hall and the conversation the boys had had. He watched Tony shovel the pie into his mouth for a few moments before plucking up the courage to speak.

"T, do you have any plans for Christmas break?"

Tony swallowed a mouthful of pie. "Bit early to be thinking about break, isn't it?"

"Just answer the question. Do you?"

He set the tray down on his lap. "Go home, probably. Read. Catch up on work I missed."

"Sounds nice."

Jeff set his stare on the floor. Tony's expression flickered.

"Is it about your dad?" he asked, his voice lowering to just above a whisper.

Jeff shrugged.

"Don't give me that," Tony set the tray atop his bedside cabinet and examined Jeff with renewed focus. "He didn't pick up again today either, did he?"

Jeff could feel his cheeks flaring, but he shook his head all the same. "Six is a lot of messages, T…"

He felt Tony's hand on the side of his arm. Something large and unpleasant was fighting its way up Jeff's throat, but he fought to contain it.

"I dunno, I don't really wanna be at his over the break," he said, looking at Tony. "But it's not like I want to be here either, you know what I mean?"

Tony nodded. He was there, and yet he wasn't, because Tony still had a mother and father who cared about him enough to pick up the phone every Saturday morning when he called.

"Hey, you sure you don't want me to come with you next time?" Tony asked. "I can buy my own Black Jacks, you know."

Jeff laughed, remembering the sweets stashed in his jacket pocket.

"I can't ask you to wake up that early just for me," he said, handing Tony the bag.

"Oh, but you can," Tony said, reaching into the bag and unwrapping a sweet without hesitation. As he finished the sentence, his cheeks turned pink, and he had to clear his throat before popping the Black Jack into his mouth.

It was an off-handed comment, but Jeff could almost feel his heart lightening as Tony looked at him, smiling as he chewed on the licorice. The idea of having Tony attend his laughable attempts at reaching his estranged father was still laughable, but the very fact that he even mentioned it made all the difference.

Jeff rose from the beanbag chair. Before he could doubt himself, he reached an arm around Tony's shoulder and gave him a light squeeze.

"Thanks, T."

Tony spluttered, perhaps fighting with the licorice clinging to his teeth.

"What for?" he managed to cough out.

"Just…" Jeff felt his ears burn. "Just listening."

Tony laughed. "Oh. Well, you'd do the same for me."

"You bet."

The corners of Jeff's mouth trembled, and for a moment time seemed to slow as they looked at each other. Then something changed in Jeff's gaze, and he grinned at Tony before leaving the room, closing the door gently on his way out.

When Jeff visited the general store late that night, two things surprised him.

One - there were more than five people inside when he walked through the door. That was a fairly low-order sort of surprise, given he only ever went in the early mornings. Still, he heard from kids who regularly snuck out at about this time of night, and all of them said the place was about as lively as a morgue around closing time.

Two - there was a monkey sitting on the counter right next to the cash register. Most of the customers were peering at the monkey - a blond woman was watching the primate with glee while a sallow-faced teen regarded it with more apprehension. The attendant, who was leaning on the counter, looked positively jovial. When he caught Jeff's eye, he flashed a grin and motioned for him to come closer.

"Alright there, mate?" he said.

"Is that…?"

The attendant let out a hearty laugh. "Gave me a bi' o' a frigh' when I firs' saw 'im, I'll tell you tha'! Settled down after he got some gum though, he's been quie' for some time."

Jeff watched the monkey. It chewed for a few seconds before opening its mouth slightly and blowing an impressive bubble.

"Whose is it?" he asked, casting the other customers a quick look. They sent him equally bewildered looks.

"Go' no bloody idea!" the attendant chimed in. "Don' even remember when he got in, to be honest!"

"Why is it chewing gum?" the sallow-faced teen asked, still scrutinizing the monkey as if afraid it might jump out at him.

The attendant let out another laugh as he, along with the others, watched the monkey blow another bubble. It was even bigger than the last one. Any bigger, Jeff thought, and he might very well be carried away by it.

"When I firs' saw 'im, I tried to give 'im a bi' o' food," the attendant said. "Figured he was starvin', y'know, with how cold i' is outside. He mus've been well fed though, 'cause he turned away damn near everything I tried to give him. Bu' when he saw the gum, he wen' haywire, y'know? Almos' tore everythin' in the booth up trying to ge' a piece of it."

"Ridiculous," the teen said, with a hint of revulsion as he headed out of the store.

The attendant was still smiling when he turned to Jeff.

"Anyway, lookit you!" he said, "Mus' be a firs', you bein' out this late 'n all."

Jeff tore his eyes off the monkey, who was now prodding at the Plexiglas while the blond woman giggled.

"Yeah, guess it is."

"Wha' brings you ou' here, then? Another call?"

Jeff thought about it for a moment.

"Suppose so," he responded. "Friend of mine needs help."

"More Black Jacks, I assume?" The attendant was already popping open a paper bag. "This mate of yours is single-handedly keepin' the ligh's on in this place by buyin' that rubbish up, y'know tha'?"

Jeff laughed. "No, not more sweets, sorry. Different friend. Not at this school."

"Hold on." The attendant's smile faltered. "You're not thinkin' of goin' on a trip, are you? At this time? All by yourself?"

In the broadest sense, Jeff understood the level of fear the attendant felt in his stead. It had even hit him a little bit as Tony helped him hop over the gate. It intensified when he'd walked away, trying to burn the mental snapshot of Tony scurrying up the steps into his brain as he receded into the distance. Yet, as soon as he'd opened the door to the store and felt the warm air hit his face, a peculiar sort of calm washed over him.

"Yeah, I am."

"This friend really needs you then, huh?" the attendant asked. "No chance I can talk you ou' of it?"

"Yeah, she does."

The attendant bit his lip, but then broke out into a smile.

"Tell you wha'," he said. "If you buy a pack of this gum for a quid, I'll throw in…"

He grabbed the monkey, sliding it through the opening in the Plexiglas and onto the customer side of the counter.

"…this guy, eh?"

"What? Why?"

"I can't have you ou' there a' nigh' by yourself, can I?" the attendant said. "Leas' I can do is give you a bi' o' company along the way. Don' worry - if you've go' even a bi' o' gum on you he'll stick to you like…well…"

"Gum, yeah," Jeff finished with a chuckle. He passed the attendant one of two pounds he had on him. The attendant tossed him the packet. Sure enough, as soon as the monkey saw the exchange, it looked at Jeff with palpable newfound respect.

Jeff took a long look around the general store as he tucked the packet into his pocket. The attendant watched him, and his smile faded.

"You're no' comin' back, are you?"

Jeff shrugged. Yes, he supposed, he didn't know when he'd be back. On the other hand, he was possessed by a sense of direction he hadn't ever felt before. The need to move had melted from the dream to a place deep in his bones, igniting a compass needle pointing resolutely south. He had no idea who this friend was. Her name had already slipped from his memory when he woke up. Yet he knew that, for whatever reason, he would know who she was the moment he saw her in the flesh for the first time.

Someone out there needed him desperately, and that was all the reason he needed to go.

Jeff waved the attendant goodbye and headed for the door. When he opened it, he let his new companion leave first.