So people started wiggling their fingers at each other. And circling their extended index fingers around each other to let someone know they had gone on talking for too long. And shooting one index finger, then another, at someone to indicate that they had hard information specifically relating to what was being said.

“I don’t like this shit,” I said to Jaden, back in our room. “I don’t like these kids coming in there and running the building like it’s their show. And what the hell are they doing pulling all those big orange barrels into the lobby from the streets that are being worked on?”

Jaden shrugged. It wasn’t like José’s shrug that tried to pretend something wasn’t a big deal when it was. It was a real carefree shrug, 100 percent Jaden. He seemed to like the newcomers.

“José told me he’s making shields out of them,” Jaden said.

“Shields?”

“Yeah, shields,” Jaden said. “He seems to think they’ll be good to have around, even if we don’t need them. I guess I’d rather have a shield and not need it than need a shield and not have it.”

“When in your life have you ever needed shields before?”

Jaden got serious suddenly. “I would bet that most of the people here have needed defending at one time or another.”

That shut me up. But just for a minute.

“Shields or no shields,” I said, “I don’t like these kids. They slag okay, I’ll give them that, but they think this is their place. This is our place.”

“Yeah, Makayla, ours. Yours, mine, and everyone who’s slagged for it. Including those kids.”

Jaden put his arms on my shoulders and held me away from him. He looked at me for a minute. We were so still that I could feel my left eyelid twitching, something that had only recently started happening.

“You’re so nails, Makayla,” he said. “You always used to pretend, but I saw through it. Now I barely know who you are. When did you get this way?”

I couldn’t answer him. I loved him. Maybe more than I loved myself. But I couldn’t let him know how broken I’d become.

2 Things weren’t quite upswing between Jaden and me after that. We worked together, we slept in the same room, we still had sex, all that was the same. But there was this space between us. He would stand back and watch me. Sometimes I bit my tongue, like when people started picking up on José’s stupid hand motions, and getting really into them. Okay, maybe I was wrong. Maybe it was best. But as I stood there, hands on my hips, not talking on purpose, I could feel Jaden’s eyes on me. Watching and waiting. When I looked his way, he looked in the other direction.