Sully is trying to help. Never before have I had his caliber of person on my side, even though I suspect most of what he’s doing is simply an apology. He told me he’d encouraged Alex to report me. But when he admitted that, it wasn’t anger I felt toward him. I just felt a part of a great, collective exhaustion. Alex reeled him in, just like she did with the rest of us, and now all we can do is try to fumble our way home.

I pick up the soup spoon as Sully sits across from me at the table, my hand trembling as a lift a mouthful of food to my lips. I manage to swallow a few spoonfuls of chicken, vegetables, and rice, when there’s a loud knock at the front door. Sully looks at me for a second before he gets up and moves out of the kitchen, Gravy trying hard to be the first one into the living room. I stand, too, but hover with my hand on the kitchen doorframe. The only person I want it to be is Morris with Will. But it’s never going to happen. Alex has full control.

Sully opens the door, and Chase is standing there. He looks tired. In the week and a half that’s gone by, he’s lost a lot of his beefiness.

“All good?” he asks, looking mostly at me, but I can tell he now knows the question is redundant. “I thought we should have a team talk.”

“Of course. Come in.” Sully steps aside for him, but there’s a stiffness to his welcome. For a second I wonder if, deep down, they still feel like they’re competing.

Chase moves through the living room and straight toward me, where he puts a hand on each of my shoulders, stares into my face, and then wraps me up in a hug. I exhale into it. For all that he’s been through himself, he’s still clinging to some kind of positivity about the world. Not everyone is good, he’s learned, but those who remain need to be looked after.

“How are you holding up?” he asks me.

“How’s Will?”

He nods, his mouth bunched reassuringly, and then he walks me back to my seat at the kitchen table. Sully follows, and so does Gravy.

“How’s Alex?” It’s impossible for me not to ask after her, and perhaps that’s one of the cruelest parts. I love her, and she hasn’t changed. Again and again she insists that it’s me against her. The only thing that’s evolved over the years is that the fights she forces me into have gotten more catastrophic.