Lannie knelt by the front steps of the red brick school, scooping a wandering beetle into her clear plastic carrier. Three pill bugs already huddled inside. A spider watched from the corner of the lid with steady, careful eyes. Lannie sighed. She saved them every morning. By afternoon, they crawled right back into danger. "They keep returning," the spider said flatly. His name was George Silkweaver. "I have mapped it. Four rescues. Same tile. Same bug." A small june bug shuffled up beside her shoe. "I keep thinking the grass is safer," he said. "I keep thinking that every time." He stared at a boot print in the dirt and said nothing more. Lannie looked at the carrier. She looked at the wide lawn behind the school. Saving wasn't enough. They needed somewhere to stay. Somewhere shoes could not reach. She spent the afternoon building it. Scrap wood, smooth stones, soft moss, tiny doorways at every level. She added shelves, hollows, and a little porch with flowers in cups. By sunset, a small wooden house stood tucked beneath the hedge, far from any footpath. Lannie opened the carrier lid. George Silkweaver stepped out first and inspected the third doorway. The june bug followed, quiet as ever. The pill bugs rolled inside. For the first time, Lannie's rescues had a home — and tomorrow, she would need to tell the others where to find it.

Morning came, and Lannie found the hedge crushed flat near the shelter's entrance. A heavy boot print sat in the dirt. Inside, George Silkweaver huddled against a stone, shaking. Lannie's stomach went cold. Someone had come close. She pulled out her phone and opened the ring camera app. The footage played. The gym teacher stood at the hedge, scanning, then stomped down hard before walking off. Lannie saved the clip. Evidence. She found Oliver Beetles by the first grade door, bug shirt and all. "I need a watcher during gym class," Lannie said. Oliver nodded once. "I'll log every move," he said. "He won't see me." Outside the fence, the stray orange and white dog was sniffing the grass. Lannie crouched and offered half her sandwich. "Guard the hedge," she whispered. The dog sat down beside the gap like he'd been waiting for the job. She still needed to hide the crushed spot. Lannie carried over the small wooden garden sign from the planter beds and staked it in the broken gap. Leaves draped. From the path, it looked like the sign had always been there. By lunch, the shelter was hidden, watched, and guarded. George Silkweaver stopped shaking. But Lannie kept glancing at the old greenhouse past the field, its glass dim under vines. If the boot came back, she'd need somewhere new.

By Tuesday, the shelter was hidden, watched, and guarded — but Lannie couldn't reach it. The gym teacher had started walking the field before school, after school, and twice during her prep block. Lannie watched from the science room window as Coach Sandra Martinez paced a fresh white line that hadn't been there last week. Crisp running lanes now stretched across the grass, ending three steps from the hedge. "She painted lanes," Lannie said. The science teacher didn't look up from her beetle tank. She slid a brown leatherbound book across the counter. The cover was soft from handling. Inside, blank pages waited. Lannie took the journal to the window and started logging. 7:42 — Coach at the south lane. 8:15 — Coach at the hedge corner. 10:30 — Coach running drills. 12:05 — Coach eating a sandwich on the bleachers, watching. By Thursday, Lannie had three pages of times. A pattern showed up between 1:50 and 2:10, when Coach Martinez was inside reviewing relay tape. Twenty minutes. Enough to refill the shelter's water dish and check on George Silkweaver. On Friday at 1:51, Lannie slipped out the side door with the bug carrier. She crossed the painted lanes and crouched at the garden sign. George Silkweaver was already at the entrance, waiting. "Three nights of dry weather," he said. "Water level dropped by half. I logged it." George JuneBug sat behind him on a pebble. "I keep thinking the grass is safer," he said. "I keep thinking that every time." Lannie poured fresh water and set down a bottle cap of sugar paste. Eight minutes left. She was zipping the carrier when sneakers stopped on the path behind her. Coach Martinez stood at the edge of the lane, clipboard under her arm. "You're on my track," Coach said. "I know your schedule," Lannie said before she could stop herself. Coach Martinez looked at the journal sticking out of Lannie's pocket. She looked at the garden sign. She looked at the hedge. "Field day's in three weeks," Coach said. "After that, the lanes come up." She walked off without waiting for a reply. Lannie stood there with the carrier in her hand. Three weeks. The patrol wouldn't stop — it would get worse, every day, until the relay was over. The twenty-minute window was the only one she had, and now Coach Martinez knew about it. Lannie tucked the journal deeper into her pocket and looked past the field, toward the old greenhouse under its vines. She would need the backup shelter ready before field day, not after.

Monday morning, Lannie found them before the first bell. Five strangers, all clustered near the chalk start line where sneakers would land in under an hour. A long-legged fly on the lane paint. A woolly caterpillar inching across lane three. A bumblebee low in the clover. A ladybug on a hurdle leg. And, half-tucked under a rubber starting block, a masked hunter bug with its front legs folded like a knife. Lannie crouched. "Names?" she whispered. Each one answered George. She wrote it down five times. The ledger sat open on her knee, its red cover smudged with grass. She filled a fresh page: George the Long-Legged Fly, George the Woolly Caterpillar, George the Bumblebee, George Ladybug, George the Masked Hunter Bug. She drew arrows showing where she found each one. The shelter under the hedge was out. Coach Martinez would be on the field in twenty minutes, and the garden sign was being watched. The greenhouse wasn't ready. Lannie had nowhere to put five bugs, and the painted lanes were about to fill with running shoes and the long metal benches the coach dragged out for timing heats. She looked at the bench stand parked at the curve of the track. Five seats bolted to a steel frame, waiting to be wheeled into place beside lane one. Whichever George she missed would be under it by third period. Lannie stood up. She had a shed key, a roll of window screen in the supply closet, and a free prep block. She ran. By 8:40, she had it built. An old wooden cabinet from the custodian's overflow, dragged behind the science room and stood upright against the brick. She drilled air holes. She lined the inside with five small mesh compartments, each one labeled with a strip of masking tape and a name. Water dish. Leaf. Twist of damp paper towel. A separate cage for the masked hunter, because it ate the others. The science teacher passed her in the hall, glanced at the cabinet, and said nothing. She came back two minutes later with a jar of aphids and set it on top. Lannie carried the bug rescue carrier out at 8:52. She got the fly first, then the ladybug, then the bumblebee in a folded index card, then the caterpillar in her palm. The masked hunter she coaxed onto a stick. By 9:04, all five Georges were locked in their compartments behind the science room, fed, watered, and breathing. Lannie closed the ledger. The cabinet wasn't a home. It was a holding cell, and it would hold for maybe a week. She had until field day to finish the greenhouse, and now she had five more lives counting on it.

By lunch, Lannie had the cabinet fed and locked. Five Georges shifted behind mesh. The masked hunter watched the ladybug through two walls of screen. Lannie counted the days on her thumb. Six until field day. Six until the painted lanes came up and the coach's patrols eased. The cabinet wouldn't last six days. The greenhouse had to be ready by Sunday. She grabbed the carrier and cut across the back lot. The old greenhouse sat behind the maintenance fence, half-swallowed by ivy. The blue door had swelled in its frame. Lannie shoved it with her hip until it popped. Inside, the air was hot and green. Vines had crawled up the panes and knotted along the ceiling ribs. A tray of dead marigolds sat on the bench. Broken glass crunched under her shoe. She had two hours before the bell and no help. She heard footsteps in the gravel. Oliver Beetles ducked under the ivy, backpack sagging with what looked like pruning shears. He was the first grader she'd stationed near the hedge during gym class — small, serious, and loyal to the bugs. He set the shears on the bench without a word. "You said Sunday," Oliver said. "That's four school days. I brought clippers and a broom." "You're supposed to be at recess." "I ate fast." He looked at the ivy on the ceiling. "That has to come down first, or the light won't reach the compartments." Lannie handed him the shears. She dragged the marigold tray outside. Oliver climbed the potting bench and started cutting vines in short, careful snips. Green ropes fell around them. Lannie swept glass into a pile with a broken slat. She hauled out two rotted crates and a bucket of standing water. A snail clung to the bucket rim. She lifted him off and set him under a fern. By the second bell, half the ceiling was clear. Sun came through in stripes. Lannie set the bug rescue carrier on the cleaned bench and opened it a crack — not to release them, just to check the air. The bumblebee George crawled to the mesh and looked up. The woolly caterpillar George pressed his face against the screen. Behind her, on a dusty pane, a golden-brown shape stretched one long leg, then another. George Silkweaver had already found the greenhouse. His new web ran from a rafter to the door hinge. "Corner rafter," he said, calm as ever. "Three exits. I checked." Lannie exhaled. She hadn't moved him. He had moved himself. Oliver climbed down. "It's usable. Not done. Usable." Lannie latched the carrier and set it on the bench. The cabinet behind the science room could empty by Friday. She had a greenhouse now — dirty, cracked, but standing. Then the gravel outside crunched again. Heavier. A track shoe. Coach Martinez's voice cut through the ivy. "Butterworth. Come out."

Lannie stepped out of the greenhouse and pulled the blue door shut behind her. Coach Martinez stood in the gravel with her arms crossed, ponytail tight, whistle flat against her track jacket. She was the one who had rolled Lannie's laminated footpath card into a paper airplane on the first day of school. Lannie still had the photo. "Butterworth." "Coach." "You have bugs in there." "Not yet." Coach Martinez looked past her at the ivy-wrapped panes. "Sunday. That's what the first grader told the lunch lady. Sunday you're moving them." Lannie's throat tightened. Oliver was still inside. She heard him go very still on the potting bench. "I need containers," Lannie said. "If I move them loose, they'll scatter. Or get stepped on. That's the whole thing I'm trying to stop." Coach Martinez didn't answer right away. She looked at her runners. Then at the greenhouse. Then at Lannie. "Field day is Saturday now. Not next week. Principal moved it." Lannie felt the ground shift. "Saturday." "My anchor runner drops the baton every practice. I kept him. We race Westbrook in five days." Coach Martinez pulled something from her jacket pocket. Six clear deli containers, stacked, lids rubber-banded. Small holes punched in each lid. "Cafeteria was tossing them." Lannie stared. "I don't want them on my track Saturday," Coach Martinez said. "I don't want them under a shoe. Mine or a kid's. Take the containers. Move them tonight. Not Sunday." "Tonight." "Building's open until six for custodial. After that the alarm's on." She held the stack out. "You have until six." Lannie took them. The plastic was still warm from the coach's pocket. "One more thing," Coach Martinez said. "The dog by the hedge. Keep him off the field Saturday. Kids will trip." "Okay." Coach Martinez turned and walked back through the gravel. She didn't look back. Lannie shoved the door open. Oliver was already climbing down from the bench. "Six containers," he said. "Five Georges. One spare." "We move them now." They ran. The cabinet behind the science room was three buildings over. Lannie unlatched each compartment and coaxed the Georges into the deli cups one at a time. The bumblebee went first, calm. The ladybug walked in on her own. The masked hunter took the longest; she used a folded index card to guide him. The junebug clicked against the plastic. The woolly caterpillar curled in a tight ring at the bottom of his cup. She snapped each lid. By five-forty they were back at the greenhouse. Lannie set the five cups on the clean bench in a row. Above them, on his web by the rafter, George Silkweaver watched. "Corner rafter's ready," he said. Lannie unbanded the lids but didn't lift them. Sunday was gone. Saturday was coming. The Georges were housed, sealed, and safe on the bench, and the field day she'd been counting toward had just moved a day closer.