She slumps, and my instinct is to let the room fall into silence, but Jo sets down her tea as if this were any normal gathering.

“He was on leave? I’d thought you were Norwegian, neutral.”

“Nils is, ah, a dual citizen,” Marit says, nodding to me. “Finnish. He signed up. He is, was, very—it mattered to him. The world. But the war was war. You know? He was sent to Lithuania. Had to go dig out bodies, little dead children from a school that got bombed. His captain got shot, Nils had to hold his—what do you call?—intestines inside his body. They went by farms, burned, everybody starving. People would try to make them take their babies. Scream and beg.”

We sit in weighted silence, unable to look at each other.

“He made a promise, but sometimes promises change. They have to change.”

Their furtiveness. The lack of camping permits. They’re deserters. Nils was, at least. He hid from the war and died anyway.

Tears glitter in Marit’s eyes without falling. She’s strong. I can’t fathom what it takes for her to say these things.

“What about Christian?” I ask.

“He was an idiot!” She giggles, but it erodes instantly into sobs, and we all reach out for her.

A floorboard creaks behind us. I turn to see Hugh hovering in the doorway and realize he’s been listening for quite a while. Anger glimmers behind his eyes as they meet mine.

The sting of it hits me. It’s a familiar reaction, this vague, confused guilt, the sense that I’ve done something wrong just by existing. That I’m somehow even more horrible for not realizing what I’ve done.

I haven’t felt like this for years. Not since meeting Hugh. He’s supposed to be my safe harbor.

Jo turns to him in greeting, a single worry line creasing her forehead.

Instead of waving hello back, Hugh says, “Matty has radios, then.”

Jo smiles at me, pleading for help switching gears.

Hugh inches forward. “I heard you mention monitoring equipment. Old tech, is it? Analog?”

“I would think he has radios,” Jo answers briskly. “Everybody’s using everything in this war.”

“He had them this whole time.”

I shake my head. “Why does that—?”

Hugh makes a fist. Hits the doorframe in slow motion. “I asked him. I was desperate, and I forced myself to ask him if he had anything that we could use to communicate with.” His jaw goes stiff, jutting. “I should have known not to trust him.”

Jo half rises, glancing between all of us. “I’m not sure he’s strictly permitted to use his government issue for personal—”

Sally tuts, nodding. “Could be treason.”

Hugh stalks out, slamming the door behind him like a petulant child.

I follow, shoot the room an apologetic grimace, and follow. Again.

Hugh stops mid-corridor and whirls on me. “What other equipment does he have there?”