Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children - BOOCarz

through its shifting muck, trying to remember the route
of semi-invisible grass islands Emma had used to
cross it, I worried that all I would find on the other side
was more rain and a ruined house. So it was with
great relief that I emerged from the cairn to find
September third, 1940, just as I’d left it: the day warm
and sunny and fogless, the sky a dependable blue,
clouds forming shapes that seemed comfortingly
familiar. Even better, Emma was there waiting for me,
sitting on the edge of the mound casting stones into
the bog. “About time!” she cried, jumping to her feet.
“Come on, everyone’s waiting for you.”
“They are?”
“Ye-es,” she said with an impatient eye roll, taking
my hand and pulling me after her. I sparked with
excitement—not only at her touch, but at the thought of
the day that lay ahead, full of endless possibility.
Though in a million superficial ways it would be
identical to the day before—the same breeze would
blow and the same tree limbs would fall—my
experience of it would be new. So would the peculiar
children’s. They were the gods of this strange little
heaven, and I was their guest.
We dashed across the bog and through the forest
as if late for an appointment. When we reached the
house, Emma led me around to the backyard, where
a small wooden stage had been erected. Kids were
bustling in and out of the house, carrying props,
buttoning up suit jackets, and zipping into sequined
dresses. Warming up was a little orchestra, made up
of just an accordion, a battered trombone, and a
musical saw that Horace played with a bow.
“What’s this?” I asked Emma. “Are you guys putting
on a play?”
“You’ll see,” she said.
“Who’s in it?”
“You’ll see.”