Page 42 of Possibly Texas

“Uh, thanks,” I replied. “Um, what’s all this?”

Auggie turned to me and smiled, his teeth even whiter in the now darker room.

“My art.” He sighed happily.

“Art?”

“Well,” Auggie explained as he moved away from the door, “installation art. I’m not much of a painter—I mean, look at my face—and I can’t really draw. My sculpting is pretty good. But I’m really good at installation art. So, that’s the kind of art I do.”

He put his hands on his hips and surveyed the giant cylinder—maybe it was an old, small grain silo?—at the center of the room. I stared at the cylinder for a few moments with him, then turned to watch him as he looked up on his “creation” with pride.

“It’s…impressive?”

Auggie laughed.

“You don’t even know what it is,” he cooed. “How can you call it ‘impressive,’ huh?”

“You’re right,” I said. “I don’t have a clue what is going on here.”

We both laughed.

“Are you going to tell me?” I asked finally.

“No,” Auggie said. “Not today. I just wanted you to see it.”

“That’s kind of a tease.” I crossed my arms over my chest and glared at him.

He held his hands up defensively.

“It’s not quite done yet,” he explained. “When it’s done—like a week or so?—you can come see how it works. You and I can be the guinea pigs.”

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“Guinea—what am I signing up for here?” I laughed nervously.

“It won’t hurt you.” Auggie rolled his eyes. “Stop being such a coward.”

“I’m not a coward.” I reached out and nudged his shoulder playfully and he stumbled back with a giggle. “I just don’t want to be the idiot who agrees to something that might lead to losing a finger. Or leg.”

“It won’t do that,” he said. “Promise. I just wanted you to see the barn since you were so curious about it and everything. Now you know it’s nothing malevolent.”

“Malevolent?”

“It means—”

“I know what malevolent means, jerk.” I nudged him again. “I just never thought that about it is all. I just thought it was unusual that you lived here. And that there were strange lights coming from it at night. That’s all.”

“Mmmhm.”

“Seriously.”

“Okay.” Auggie shrugged. “Well…now you know.”

“But you’re not going to tell me what all of this is?”

“Nope.” He grinned.