“Can you grab me the hydrogen peroxide from the bathroom?” Kate calls to Tess. She sits Alice down cross-legged by the fire. Tess brings cotton balls, too, and Alice watches Kate work, cleaning, careful. Alice hears the kids come out of the kitchen, watching, asking questions. She can’t turn her head to look at them; Kate is holding her chin firmly as she works on her.

“She’s okay,” Tess says to the children. “Aunt Kate, your mom, is taking care of her.”

Quinn isn’t cold any longer. Her hands are warm from holding Maddie, from helping her get dressed, but also somehow still cold, hard and aching, in the bones. Tess swept through with dry clothes for both of them, so many towels. She’s wearing what she thinks might be Alice’s pants now, a long sweater. Alice gave her a pair of underwear that still had the tag on.

Quinn thinks, still holding on to Maddie, that she’ll have to ask Alice to let her keep her. She can’t imagine anything so perfect as her daughter—her pink, flushed skin, her hands. She wants to sweep her up and hold her, to take her home and fold her into bed with her and not ever let her out. But instead they go downstairs, and Maddie breaks free of her and starts playing with the other children. She’s wearing one of the other girls’ clothes—Quinn can’t remember which one, can’t quite place their names, though she was told. They’ve asked them to stay for dinner, though Quinn wants to run, to pack Maddie in a car—whichever of those lined up in the driveway is parked closest to the road—just like she did that day her mother caught her using, to drive and drive until it’s just the two of them for good. She thinks, first, she’ll stay and let these people feed them, let Maddie sit in this warm house until they’re both steady enough to go.

She sits down on the couch as Maddie and the children settle into some game with Magna-Tiles and small horses. Tess gave Maddie a grilled cheese and a large glass of milk as soon as they came out of the bathroom, and Quinn keeps a glass of water by her side that she offers to Maddie each time she comes close. She also has a bowl of cut-up fruit, potato chips, a granola bar, slices of pork, all of which the women gave her, but Maddie’s brushed her off to play with the other children each time Quinn’s tried to get her to eat more. You must be so tired, she said to her. I slept, though, Maddie said, in the igloo. I’m fine, she keeps saying to Quinn, though Quinn can’t yet stop feeling scared. It was warm in there.