Harry came to visit a few days later. Hannah wasted no time in filling him in on everything that had happened. As usual, he seemed to know much more than she did.

“Oh yeah, I’ve known Mrs. Robeson for years,” he said. “She showed me some pictures she took in New Zealand once – said that someday when she had enough money she’d take me, since she knows I like photography. She’s great. A little scary, though, sometimes.”

“Yeah,” Hannah agreed. She remembered the way Mrs. Robeson had cut Mr. Sewell off. “But… a good kind of scary, I think. How’s school going? How’s Seb?”

Harry’s face darkened a little. “Um – he’s – fine, I guess. I just – I don’t know, Hannah. Maybe it’s not worth it.”

“What’s not worth what?”

“Maybe – maybe I should wait. You know. To tell people – Seb, I mean – that I like him. I mean, I know he likes boys. He doesn’t have a problem talking about it. But I just feel like there’s… no taking it back, you know?”

“No,” said Hannah. “I don’t. You should just tell him. Because it’s true.”

 Harry winced and changed the subject. Hannah let him, because of the expression on his face.

“Anyway, that Topher guy you were talking about,” he said. “He was in the Post a few days ago. He’s our age; did you know that? Apparently he was at one of those concerts at the Verizon Center. You know, where you get a cheaper price for a ticket because it’s a full moon, and people are scared to go out.”

“What?!” said Hannah. “That’s – that’s the werewolf equivalent of sexism! Unless they let us buy tickets and come as wolves. We could howl along with the music…”

Harry pretended he wasn’t smiling. “Well, he didn’t even make into the building. He was there with his dad, and they were getting in line, just walking down the street – a pretty crowded street, actually – and this wolf appeared out of nowhere. They didn’t catch it, either. That’s why it’s such a big story; it totally vanished. The guy’s still out there somewhere.”

“Or girl,” said Hannah. “It could be a girl.”

“Or girl,” he conceded. “Nobody knows who it was. It was probably an accident, of course – the wolf probably couldn’t control itself. But still…”

Hannah did not want to think about that. He knew where she stood on that.

“Do you know anything about that Rumon place Mrs. Robeson was talking about?” she said, steering the conversation back to safer waters. “Rose sounded scared.”

“Rumon? No.” Harry looked puzzled. “I’ve never even heard of it. I guess it’s a town or something.”

“Must be a pretty interesting town if The Washington Post wants Mrs. Robeson to do an article on it,” said Hannah. “And neither of them would tell me anything. Even when I asked Rose the next day.”

“Mrs. Robeson probably has to keep the details secret,” said Harry. “The Post wouldn’t want their big story to leak out before they even got a chance to write it.”

“I guess,” said Hannah. “It seems weird, though. I mean, Mrs. Robeson’s been all over the world. She’s been to places that are way more dangerous than Rumon, whatever it is. She told me she was in Iraq only a year after 9/11.”

“Well then, there’s nothing to worry about,” said Harry sensibly. “We’ll find out eventually. You always do, with Mrs. Robeson.”

If Hannah had thought there was a chance she wouldn’t go against Rose’s orders and try to talk to Topher, the next few days proved her wrong. With Mrs. Robeson gone from the hospital and her family adjusted to their new routine, Hannah had even less to do than before. When she finally beat the last level of Fruit Ninja, she knew that Operation Topher was going to be something she could not help.

The question was how to do it. She had to find a time when both Rose and David were off doing other things, with no chance that they might suddenly return. For three days, Hannah popped in and out of Rose’s office, trying to learn her daily movements. Unfortunately, Rose’s schedule seemed to be in a constant state of change; Hannah kept running into her in the hallway. She had just about given up hope when she suddenly got her chance.

“Hannah, I’ve had a phone call,” said Rose, coming into her room at a much earlier hour than Hannah would have liked. “Mr. Sewell’s had a problem with his papers, and we’ve got to go and speak to his lawyer. David and I will be downstairs at the Starbucks if you need us. We’ll probably be finished around lunchtime.”

“Let me sleep,” said Hannah, throwing one of her pillows at Rose. “It’s not even ten yet.”

But when Rose left the room, Hannah found she was wide awake. It was now or never; she was sure of it. She pulled on a bright red band T-shirt that Tom had handed down to her, turned to go, and then ran back for a stick of purple hair chalk. There was something about having purple in her hair that made her feel braver, more determined. She made two little purple braids and then headed into the hall.

She looked at Topher’s door for a second, wiped her fingertips on her jeans, and went in.

The room was a mess. Piles of clothes littered the floor, hung from doorknobs, and dangled off the dresser. A stack of unopened boxes – sympathy gifts, probably – sat untouched in one corner. In the other, Hannah saw a heap of sundry items: a CD player, a box set of science fiction novels, some photographs in frames, a pillow in the shape of a pineapple. It looked like someone had brought the entire contents of their bedroom into the hospital before deciding they didn’t want a single piece of it. It was so overwhelming that Hannah stared for a full minute before she remembered Topher.

He was in bed, and only his face was visible. Hannah looked closer; she noticed choppily cut dark hair, a square chin, and the thickest set of eyebrows she had ever seen. He wasn’t asleep. His eyes were open, flitting around the room. They settled on Hannah. They looked away.

“Um,” she said. She realized she hadn’t prepared anything to say. She thought quickly. “I’m Hannah. You’re… Topher, right?”

He kept looking away from her.

Well. She’d have been a fool if she’d thought it was going to be that easy. “I’m staying across the hall from you,” she said. “So I thought I’d come say hi. Because I’m bored out of my mind.”

No, that sounded awful. She tried again.

“I saw your dad for a few days ago. He seemed kind of gloomy, but I liked his goatee. Isn’t it unfair that men can grow beards and women can’t? I saw this TV special once about a woman with a beard, but it’s not like that’s exactly normal. Plus it didn’t match her hair.”

Now she just sounded like she belonged in an asylum. Hannah wasn’t used to this. She couldn’t remember the last time she had talked to someone who hadn’t talked back.

“Not that it matters,” she said, with just a touch of desperation. “Women can have beards if they want to. I don’t want to sound like I’m prejudiced or anything. I’d probably grow a beard if nature would let me.”

His apathy was unmistakable this time: He rolled over onto his side and glared at the wall. He didn’t want to speak to her – and worse, he almost definitely thought she was an imbecile.

Now she was angry.

She marched further into the room until she was right up next to the bed, scowling down into Topher’s face amid his rumpled hospital sheets. He met her eyes coldly for half a second, then curled away from her and pulled his covers over his head, so that she couldn’t even watch him ignoring her.

“Look,” snapped Hannah. “I’m not leaving.”

She tried to project confidence into her voice, like she was supposed to be here. Like Rose or Mr. Sewell had invited her to come; like they had begged her to find a way to make Topher her friend.

“I’m not going to leave until you talk to me. I don’t care what we talk about, because at this point I’ll talk about literally anything in the world. But we have to talk about something. And you have to sit up and look at me and stop pretending that you hate me, because you don’t even know me. You’re not even sick anymore. I can tell. It doesn’t last that long.”

She looked hard at the bump under the covers that was Topher’s head. It gave a slight twitch, but didn’t resurface.

“I’m serious,” she said. “I mean it.”

She watched again. The covers gave a muffled groan.

“I’m a nice person. I really am. And I’m awesome at talking David into buying me Starbucks, and he even said he’d get me bon-bons, whatever bon-bons are. If that’s something that interests you.”

Nothing this time; not even a twitch. Hannah imagined Topher deciding that if he pretended to be dead for long enough, she’d eventually go away.

“You could get out of bed if you wanted,” she muttered. “I guess you just don’t want to.”

There was a pause, and then –

“Yeah. I guess not.”

The reply was so unexpected that it took Hannah several seconds to register that he had spoken. Topher’s voice was deeper than most people's their age, with the effect that it came out louder. It was also thoroughly and utterly imbued with sarcasm, in a way Hannah was not sure even Tom could match.

Hannah blinked. “You talked.”

“Only a little bit,” murmured Topher. “And I have no intention of doing it again.”

“But you just did do it again.”

“Against my better judgment.”

“But you did.”

He finally emerged from his covers, mostly so he could glower at her. The thick line of his eyebrows made this look more intimidating than Hannah would have liked.

“Look,” he said. “Exactly eight days ago – nine, as of tonight – I was bitten by a deranged werewolf. I’m entitled to not talking if I don’t want to talk. Whether that’s now or for the rest of my life. Go back to your happy little world full of – I dunno, facial hair – and leave me alone.”

“So you were listening,” said Hannah. “I thought so.”

“I didn’t have a choice. You weren’t shutting up. And you still aren’t, and I mean what I’m saying. Please go away. Please.”

“But that would be counterproductive,” said Hannah, smiling. “The conversation only just started.”

“Do I look like I care?”

Hannah looked. He did not.

“I just spent a week throwing up. My entire body feels like a piece of shit. My dad’s downstairs fighting with my mom’s lawyer because she doesn’t want to pay for any of my hospital bills, because she hates supernatural stuff, but she mostly just doesn’t like me. Also, I think I mentioned that I got bitten by a werewolf. Which means that I am now a werewolf. Which means that will be the status quo for the rest of my life, so you’ll excuse me if I ask you yet again to go away.”

The angry feeling inside Hannah was getting worse, not better.

“It isn’t that bad,” she said, trying as hard as she could to sound reasonable. “Being a werewolf. It’s not like your life is over or anything.”

Topher was looking away from her again. “I don’t see how you would know that.”

“I don’t see how I wouldn’t know that.” She heard her voice harden. “Considering I got bitten too. When I was eight. So I’ve been one a lot longer than you. And I’m fine. One-hundred-and-ten percent fine, so there.”

That made him look at her. If she was uncomfortable when he was avoiding her gaze, it was nothing to how she felt with his eyes boring into her own. They were gray and very serious-looking. She wasn’t sure she liked them.

“You have purple in your hair,” said Topher finally.

“I like having purple in my hair.”

“Is that a werewolf thing? Purple?”

“No. It’s a Hannah thing.”

He seemed to think about this for a moment. “Why are you in the hospital?”

“Just changing my dose.” Hannah realized that her arms had crossed themselves without her noticing. “No big deal. Just a touch-up kind of situation.”

“Right.” Topher closed his eyes. “Well, Hannah the Purple Werewolf, it wasn’t exactly nice to meet you, but I don’t know what else you’re supposed to say in these situations, so I guess I’ll lie and say it was. Fortunately for me, I still feel like shit, which means I’m going to kick you out now. Which I can do, because you aren’t even allowed to be here.”

“Fine,” said Hannah. “But I’m coming back later.”

“Fine,” said Topher. “But if you tell Rose or David or my dad or anyone that I even said a word to you, I’ll kill you myself. I don’t want to talk. To any of them. And they need to understand that.”

Hannah shut the door behind her and left. She wondered why she didn’t feel more triumphant as she walked the few steps from his room to hers. After all, she had won. She had gotten him to speak.

Still, there was a faint sense of unease that lingered with Hannah for the rest of the day. He wasn’t what she had expected. She didn’t know why.