She swipes the knife in front of her face as she exits the kitchen and takes the stairs to the lodge’s basement. She does this because more than once she’s passed through a web at the head of the steps. And more than once she’s brought the brown spiders back to Cabin Three.

“If anybody is down here, they’re gonna get stabbed.”

Despite the fold, despite her eyes being closed, Malorie still senses that she’s entered utter darkness. The unmistakable cellar smell of cold concrete and mold. It used to be she’d hurry to find the dangling cord, to bring light to a space like this. But if there’s one thing the new world has incrementally destroyed, it’s a fear of the dark.

She crosses the mostly open area and tells herself she’s only here to grab canned goods. Could be her and Shannon retrieving cranberries for the Thanksgiving meal Mom and Dad cook together upstairs. Could be the canned goods Tom the man showed her the first morning she woke in the house on Shillingham. Or it could be what it is: Malorie searching the shelf for beans, able to pick them out among the other cans because the lids are different.

“Used to be a lot more on this shelf.”

No question about that. And it feels good to assess, to do what she normally does, while listening for movement and keeping her nose open for a squatting human being who most likely pretends to be with the census.

“Who does he think he is?” she asks, unable to find the beans after all. Sometimes the gloved fingertips make this sort of task a little harder. “What did he expect me to do? Just let him in?”

As she removes the glove, as the county fair house of horrors vision of a creature reaching out and touching her exposed hand momentarily rattles her, she wonders how a man can claim to be from the census in a country where there is no organization anymore.

She finds the beans quickly and slips the glove back on.

She turns to face the basement.

Did she hear something? Something above?

The teens know the rules, but of course that doesn’t mean the teens follow them. When Malorie sweeps the camp, they are to remain in Cabin Three. It’s a waste of time to investigate sounds made by either Tom or Olympia while she’s out making sure the three of them are still alone.

“If anybody’s here,” she begins. But she doesn’t finish this time. Despite the fact that she’s gotten very good at living with fear, she’s still not immune to moments of abject horror. Like when she’s standing in the basement of an abandoned camp lodge, and a man she did not see the face of was just moments ago knocking on her cabin door.