Kicking off her slippers, she opened the drawer of the cheap dresser and looked for a clean pair of socks. When she’d first arrived in her sequined dress, which in hindsight was better than the orange prison jumpsuit, her mother had gone to Target and bought her new socks and underwear. Lorna had bought cheap cotton panties and ugly socks with fluorescent doughnuts on them. Ludicrous. But at least she’d agreed to go by Chase’s apartment a few days later to grab toiletries, her new Nike trainers, and Chase’s facial cleansing products, an exclusive line she’d bought when she was in Paris. She glanced at herself in the mirror. Her hair needed highlighting, her skin a good exfoliation, and her nails an emery board. She’d go to a spa as soon as they released her from this horrible place.

The upside was she was sober.

There was that.

Chase had just pulled on her shoes when a tiny bird landed on the windowsill and looked at her as if it had a pressing message.

“Weird,” Chase said to herself after the bird actually tapped on the window.

She rose, laces dragging, and walked cautiously toward where the sunlight streamed into her room. The little bird didn’t fly away. Instead it sat there, unafraid of her approach.

Chase didn’t know anything about birds, but she’d seen a lot of prison movies where inmates found and kept a pet bird. Maybe that was what this was. This tiny sparrow was her prison bird, a symbol of freedom sitting right outside her window. Maybe she should let the little fellow inside. She could keep it in her pocket, squirreling away crumbs to feed it. Maybe she’d name it Tweety. Kind of basic, but it was her prison bird. No one was going to judge her for giving it a lame name. It would be her best friend. Her only friend.

Chase reached toward the window, and when she touched the glass, the bird took off.

“Yeah, I’d fly away, too. You don’t want none of this, Tweety.” She stroked the sun-warmed glass, staring at the spot where the bird had sat.

The message wasn’t lost on her.

A knock sounded on her door. Like another omen.

Chase glanced at her watch. Gone was the Apple watch—no communication with the outside world—so she had been left with the Breguet, a jeweled affair one of her past lovers had gifted her. The diamonds and sapphires rocked on the red carpet, but next to the cheap cotton sweats, the flash looked wrong. Why her mother hadn’t just bought a cheapo at Target was lost on Chase. The price of this watch could pay her rehab bill. She wondered if the billing department would be up for a tradesy.

Chase shook her head, walked to the door, and opened it.

“Hello, Chase,” the woman standing on the threshold said as if she’d known Chase for years.

Not totally unexpected. Sometimes Chase saw the glint of confusion in people’s eyes when they couldn’t quite figure out how they knew her. She could see them flipping through the Rolodex in their heads, scratching out high school classmate or mom from my kid’s playgroup before realizing they knew her from the big screen or supermarket tabloids. But this woman’s manner wasn’t one Chase often encountered in fans. No, this woman had a purpose.