“You could pretend I’m not here.” Cyrus scrubs the armrest between us as he speaks, forcing me to fold my hands across my lap. “I recall that you were good at your make-believe games when we were kids.”

My face heats. “They weren’t make-believe games.” At least, they weren’t games for me. I would imagine myself as anything and everything: a poet, writing to their one true love; a princess, standing up to retrieve her crown at long last; an artist, grieving over their lost muse. Back when the future felt endless, expansive, and all the options delighted rather than terrified me. Back when I still wore my heart on my sleeve, instead of carefully concealed in ten layers of Bubble Wrap.

“You were so invested in it,” he goes on with the slightest smile. “You ran around the school trying to find someone to play your prince.”

I suppress a wince, but the decade-old humiliation blazes its way through me again. All the boys I’d asked had either laughed in my face or simply stared at me, like I was some wild thing in the woods they hoped would go away on its own if they didn’t make any sudden noises or movements. Of course they weren’t interested; I wasn’t pretty back then.

Cyrus was the only one who agreed to join in on my game, just to ruin it for me. He had made me a ring of thorns, a castle of clay, and stolen the school’s infamous cat, Evil Whiskers, to be our royal pet. The cat had scratched me even more than the ring, and I’d ended up crying in a corner.

It’s just one of the many unpleasant memories Cyrus has contributed to.

“There’s really no need to revisit that,” I say.

“Why not? Your games were super creative. I remember there was another one where we’d see who could find their way around with their eyes closed—”

“Well, I don’t remember anymore. That was ages ago.” I speak over him, desperate to change the subject. “Are you almost done with the cleaning?”

“Almost. Though I wouldn’t call anything here clean.” He picks up his blanket with only his thumb and forefinger, like he thinks it might grow teeth and bite him. I really wish it would. “Do you know how often they wash these?”

“No. But I like to trust that they do,” I say.

“I wouldn’t trust strangers at all.”

“I hate to break it to you, but you’ll have to trust the pilot not to get us killed en route to Shanghai,” I inform him.

It might just be my imagination, but his face seems to pale. Or maybe it’s because he’s still holding the blanket he’s so disgusted by.