“Oh, God,” the guard said, realizing the severity of the situation, then swore. She slapped Betsy to get her to wake up as Betsy was clearly fading out, and Rainbow lightly hit the guard in the face with three fingers in protest. Rainbow did not believe in violence—she was in jail because she stole a roasted chicken and donuts because she was starving—but she felt the guard needed a punishment.

The guard turned and hammered Rainbow, and Rainbow fell back into the wall, her head banging against the cement. Rainbow sobbed out, “Azure blue. Banana yellow. Lavender purple.”

“Wake up! Wake up!” The guard shook Betsy hard, her white face still. The guard was shocked at all the blood soaking the mattress. Other guards ran in, and Betsy was whisked off to the infirmary, blood trickling behind her, the mattress stained with Betsy’s life.

Later, after the doctors and nurses leaped to take over caring for Betsy, moving with frantic practice, the guard came back to punish Rainbow for hitting her. The guard slipped in the blood on the floor and fell on her back. Rainbow said, “It’s karma. It’s coming for you like midnight black. Gunmetal silver. You’re an infected lime green color now.” This enraged the guard because she believed in karma, too. She had Rainbow put in solitary for a week.

Rainbow whimpered as she was led away and said, “Betsy is golden yellow.”

* * *

Betsy woke up in the infirmary again, tied down, of course, wrists, ankles, waist, a different doctor leaning over her.

“What happened?” she asked. It was morning, she could tell by the light. Maybe afternoon.

“You hemorrhaged. You lost a lot of blood.”

The doctor was a woman. She had a kinder face than the nurse standing there, who looked impatient, her face scrunched like a bulldog’s. Tears welled up in Betsy’s eyes again. Rose. Rose. Rose. She would never see Rose again. Never. She wanted to die.

“You’ll stay here for a few days.”

She nodded through her tears.

“You’ll need to build your strength up. Why didn’t you ask for help?”

“Rainbow did. My cellmate. No one came.”

“I’m sorry.” She knew who Betsy was. She knew about the case. “Your trial starts soon, doesn’t it?”

She nodded. What did it matter? Her baby was gone.

Taken.

Lost.

Never to be held or kissed again.

Betsy again wished she was dead.

* * *

Betsy had the same premonition the next night in the infirmary that she’d had since she was five years old. In the midst of her delirium, as her fever spiked up and down, again and again, she was lucid enough to grasp it.

She was driving her car on a winding, too-narrow one-lane road. The sunlight was behind her, the sun setting through the tall, swaying fir trees. There were orange poppies on both sides of the road.

She curved to the left, toward the side of the mountain, distracted by the steep cliff to the right and not wanting to go over.