24
The next morning, Adi was out of the house before the family woke up. By the time she’d arrived back last night, her head still reeling from the discovery of an invisible barrier around the village, things had been back to how they’d been. Jim had barely grunted at her during dinner, avoiding looking at her. His wife had served Adi without any of her previous cheerful chatting. Where she’d placed the food carefully on Honi’s plate, she’d slammed it down on Adi’s so hard the sauce had splattered the sleeve of her shirt.
The only reason why Adi hadn’t protested was that she could tell that with Nina’s return, the family had slipped back under the same strange influence. To be fair, Honi had tried his best to involve her in some kind of conversation, but Adi had been too worried about th
