She sees Mom, blind, reaching out across the aisle. Her fingers are white and wrinkled and she says, Do you hear that? People are talking in the cabins you pass. And when people talk, they reveal themselves. And when they reveal themselves, you need to be listening.

Malorie almost starts at the sound of voices coming from her right. Her gloved hand on the wall, she understands she has come to the series of cars with rooms, like the one Tom and Olympia are in. Here people have spaces of their own. Here people have two beds, red cushions on a bench, a mirror.

Here, too, people talk.

Malorie stops. She listens.

She hears:

“…a new start. And that means everything. Not just where we live, Judy, but how we live. And how we treat each other, too…”

Malorie asks herself if she, too, is starting over. But she knows this isn’t the case. What she’s doing is justifying all the living she’s already done.

She continues, up the hall, gloved hands sliding along both walls. The fingers of her right hand intermittently touch doors. She hears voices. A new set. She pauses. She listens.

She hears:

“…have to find a bath sooner than later…”

“…longest we’ve ever gone…”

She continues. She thinks of the dead bodies in storage. The safest two passengers on board.

Her gloved fingers touch the walls. Another door.

She hears:

“…never again in my life. I mean it. No more big houses. I want us to find the smallest shack in the state to call home…”

She continues. She bumps into someone.

“Excuse me,” she says.

She has no doubt this person is eyeing her the way they did at the school for the blind. Here she stands, hoodie and gloves, blindfolded in a place where they’ve been told they don’t need to be. Long sleeves and long pants. Her hair covers her neck.

She makes to pass the person and bumps into him again.

It’s a him. She can tell. He’s soft in the middle and taller than her and he smells like a man.

“Excuse me,” she says again.