“Hey guys,” Remmy said. “I need to show you something. Can you roof-hop with me over there?” He pointed the direction that he had come.

“Sure,” Will said.

“Fiiine,” Charlotte sighed. “But this had better be good.”

“I don’t know… but it definitely looked cool from a distance,” Remmy said. “I haven’t checked it out yet. I wanted to tell you guys. Follow me.”

Will, Charlotte, and Remmy ran along the roof to the place where it sloped down. Will’s first time on the roof had been him sliding, terrified down the slops of the roof before his relieved feet hit gutter. Now, he raced along the slops, and used the gutter as a platform to boost himself across to the opposite rooftop. Charlotte, as far as Will knew has been raised to jump across rooves. She flew across them with such grace, she would probably amaze a tightrope walker.

Remmy was still a bit new to roof jumping. Will had known Charlotte for about a year, and the two had known Remmy for only two or three months, starting when Will had met him on a walk through the street looking for food before the bakery had opened. He had caught him stealing fruit from a shopping mall, and at the same time that he had been stealing fruit from the same shopping mall. The two had first be freighted that the other had seen them stealing, but, after realizing that the other had been stealing too, they had introduced themselves, Remmy had brought Will to his park to meet Ted, and Will had taken Remmy to meet Charlotte up on the roof that night.

Charlotte had been very reserved at first, but that was just how Charlotte was. She had been like that when Will had met her too. Kept to herself, and not willing to trust. But, over time she had opened to Will, and She opened up to Remmy even quicker. She was started to learn that there were many good people in the world. Not all of them were good, and Charlotte had had some bad experiences with the ones that weren’t but there were more good ones than bad. Charlotte was learning that, day by day.

Will had met Charlotte back when she was fairly new to roof-jumping. It had been at night. Long before Will had had his ladder and platform, and he had been sleeping amid a pile of garbage when he had heard a crash above him, and down Charlotte had fallen. Right onto the pile of garbage, which meant she hadn’t been hurt badly, but Will, naturally, and leaped up to his feet and ran over to her side to see if she was alright. She was bruised and a bit scratched, but you could expect that, living on the streets, even without falling from a roof. She had shakily gotten to her feet and blushed so deeply, that will could see it even in the dark.

“Are you okay?” He had asked her.

“I’m fine,” She had said turning away from him.

There had been an awkward silence after that before Will had said, “Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m fine. Do you live here?”

“Uh… No?”

“You’re a terrible liar.”

“I’m Will,” He had said, Mostly to change the subject.”

“Amazing. Mind if I sleep here? Falling from a roof is surprisingly tiring.”

“Sure.”

“Great.”

The next morning, she was gone, but about a week later, Will had passed the corner by Macy’s where Charlotte and her father lived. As soon as Will had gotten too near, Charlotte’s father was there, swearing and shouting in Will’s face. Charlotte had emerged from a tent behind him, and, the moment she saw what was going on, turned to go back inside, but she somehow seemed to recognize Will, just as he did her, despite that fact that it had been dark when they had met, and that they had only seen each other for a short time.

“Dad?” She had asked in a small voice that Will had not expected after the last time they had met. Her dad had turned to face her. “Dad?” She said again, still in that small voice, and Will got the feel his daughter was the only one he would listen to. “Come inside, okay?” She continued. He trudged inside, away from Will, and Will though he heard him collapse once he was out of sight.

“Thanks for that,” Will said.

“Yeah…” She said. “Uh, sorry about him. He hasn’t been drinking today I think, or he wouldn’t have listened. I might like him better when he is drinking though. He talks more…”  She fades away, looking extremely embarrassed, which I can tell must not be a normal emotion for her, but she must have been feeling it both the times we had met so far.

“Do you… wanna meet me somewhere soon? Just to talk?” Will had said.

“Sure,” She had said. And that was how, two nights later, he was sneaking into the building that, in less than a year, would become a bakery. Until then, it was an abandoned drugstore. He crept up the stairs to the attic that he could now get to through that window. He had climbed clumsily through the window, and cross the rooves, to the one with the large gap, where Charlotte had left him a piece of wood, across the wood, and then across many other rooves he traveled, until he reached the blues balcony, and he found Charlotte waiting for him.

They talked for hours. Will mostly, and when Charlotte did say things it wasn’t anything personal. And Will told her how he was gay, because he figured he better tell her before they became good friends, if that ever happened. If he didn’t, she would become his friend, and then ditch him when he came out, just like his family had. But when he told her about the word his mother had said, Charlotte had called her another very nasty word that she had likely heard her father screaming at woman while he was drunk, and Will had felt so much lighter, sharing his burden with someone else who actually understood him.

And all of this was playing through his mind while he and Charlotte followed Remmy, curious to see where he was taking them, until they reached one, particular roof, and the three of them gazed downward. “What is it?” Will asked, for hundreds of lights where blinking up at him from a single old looking building that he had never seen before.

“I have no idea,” Remmy said. “Should we check it out?”

Will and Charlotte nodded, and the three of them searched for the part of the gutter that reached the ground which they each grabbed, and, in turn, slid down toward the dark, quiet sidewalk. Upon reaching the ground, the three of them hurried across the street, before looking for a new way onto the roof. But the buildings were taller here, and they couldn’t find an easy way up. They would have to break in and sneak through a window in order to reach the top, and although Charlotte was all for it, Will and Remmy agreed that it wasn’t worth it. They should travel on the ground if they could. So, they darted through the alleys and raced around buildings, staying to the shadows as much as they could. Mainly because of Charlotte and maybe a bit because of Remmy. They were more likely to be recognized as thieves if they were spotted. Will was rarely a thief.

Will was rarely a thief.

They were careful as they neared the lights. They couldn’t be spotted. It could cost them everything if they were recognized. Ordinarily, if Will, Remmy and Charlotte had approached a random house with flashing lights they wouldn’t have rung the doorbell. But at this particular house, they felt that nothing bad could come of this. They could see a gutter that would be easy for them to shimmy up next to the house, and they had a lot of practice. A person in that house would have job following them up there. They allowed Remmy to press the doorbell, because he had been the one to find the house to begin with. Will was feeling slightly excited, and extremely nervous, the closer Remmy’s finger got to the doorbell.

Will had expected a ringing sound. Instead, a terrible, sheik erupted from the door, and Will and Remmy took off in the opposite direction. They made it all the way up the gutter and to the roof before they realized that Charlotte wasn’t with them, they turned on the roof to see her, still standing at the door. She rolled her eyes at them. “It was just the sound of the doorbell!“ She whisper-shouted. “No one actually screamed!”

“Oh!” Will whisper-shouted back. “Come on Remmy.” The two of them slid by down the gutter and ran back to meet up with Charlotte. “I still think it’s pretty weird and creepy,” Will said, once they had reached her again. “That the doorbell screams. Like, when I doubt about whether or not to enter a house, choose not, when the doorbell screams at you. Not a good sign.”

Remmy laughed, but Charlotte just shrugged. “I’m sure it's fine,” she said.

“You’re not actually thinking about going in there are you?” Will asked.

“Well yeah. What’s the worst that could happen?”

“Umm, like, someone inside sees us, they call the police, the police come and arrest us, and then they recognize us as wanted thieves. I have to leave my ally, you have to leave your dad, Remmy has to leave Ted, and our lives are ruined.”

“Lets go in,” Charlotte said.

“Wait what!?” Will said as Charlotte opened the door. “Charlotte? Charlotte!” But she had already vanished into the dark building. “I don’t like this,” Will said. “I don’t like this at all. The lights, the screaming door, the fact that I had never seen this place until today? I’ve been everywhere in this neighborhood. I don’t just live in it. I live on it. There’s something fishy going on here.”

“I agree,” Remmy said. “But we can’t just let her go in there alone. We’re her friend, and if there is something going on, we can’t let her handle it alone.”

“Ok,” Will said. “Let’s go.”