“I came to look for you. You’re late. What’s happening? Why’s everyone on the move?” She could see her mother’s face now, drawn with worry, glistening with sweat. The half-moon circles under her eyes were deeper and fear flashed in her eyes.

“Inside,” Bibi said, looking over her shoulder.

“Those people are going to be caught outside.”

“Maybe,” Bibi answered. “Maybe. They might find an empty house.”

Sorrel noticed her mother’s weariness and pushed away the anger that lived high in her chest. “Let’s eat, Bibi. Then you can go to bed.”

“There’s no time,” Bibi said. “We have to get ready.”

“Ready for what?”

“Inside,” Bibi said again.

The heat had settled over the house. They sat at the small kitchen table, breathing shallowly.

“We’re ordered to leave,” Bibi said. “They say this hurricane season will bring a storm surge along Buttercup Avenue. They’re posting the evacuation orders tonight.”

“Good,” Sorrel said, surprising herself.

“Good?” Bibi pointed at the open window and raised her voice. “You want to struggle to find a new place? To have to fight for it, maybe?”

“Did you hear anything about the Domins catching a Tribal girl? In the last day or two?”

“What?”

“A Tribal girl. Someone who lives – lived – in the mountains?”

“There are always stories like that, One.”

“They could be true.”

She faced her mother. We’re so weak, Sorrel thought. She’s so weak. “You have Level 3 access. Are there Tribals in the mountains?”

“You know I can’t talk about that.”

“You’d say no, if it wasn’t true. Bibi, I want to leave Bana. I want to find other people. Young people like me. I don’t want to spend my life with you in this dead city.”

Bibi reached out a hand to her. Sorrel ignored it. “I know this is hard for you –”

“Hard? It’s impossible. I don’t want to live like…like a bat or an owl or a worm. We’re all just circling around.” Sorrel took a deep breath and stood. The heat was making her dizzy. “You don’t have to come,” she shouted. “You go look for another house. You keep going to work until they think you’re too old and then they’ll cut your water ration, they’ll take back the PlAK; maybe even your foodcards will be stopped. One day you’ll go outside to find food and the Squad will get you. Or the ferals. Or you won’t make it back before the sun comes up and you’ll roast like a pig on an old-time barbecue and the good people of Bana will walk past your corpse. Remember that body we saw before the shaving law, that day at the waterfront? Remember how the cartmen threw her on the sea? And how she crumbled and floated away like ashes?”

“Why’re you bringing that up?”