The woman glanced momentarily at the young girl as she stepped forward and lowered the tray onto the small bed.  Then, without looking back at the girl, she straightened and left, pulling the door closed behind her and leaving Eshe staring quietly.

Her eyes returned to the colored pen in her tiny hand and then to the scrawling on her left forearm.

She placed the pen onto the desk before turning back to the door, wondering if she had heard correctly and whether the woman had noticed it, too.

Eshe hadn’t heard the door’s latch click shut like it had in the past.

Had she missed it?

The young girl stood up and walked to the bed, examining the plate of fruit and cheese and then picking up a date and sniffing it.

Would they do something to the food?  She’d heard stories about bad people poisoning food or putting things inside to make people tired.

Eshe lowered her hand and dropped it back onto the plate, then turned and looked up through the room’s dark window at the blanket of overhead stars.

The screaming boy from the hallway never came back, leaving Eshe not just frightened, but now sure it would probably happen to her as well.  And the other five children.

Suddenly, she remembered something from when she was younger, when she was living in another children’s home.  One of the older girls had told the group a story about her and her brother, trapped in a giant fire with several other kids, and how the adults were trying to keep them calm while the massive flames consumed everything around them.  Everyone had been cornered and screaming for help while telling the children to listen and obey.

But the girl was too scared and hadn’t listened.  She’d been defiant when they’d screamed after her, and she’d run from room to room, frantically searching for a way out.  She finally found one through a small hole in the floor just large enough to squeeze through.  Barely making it under the flooring before the roof of the building had collapsed.

The girl told them the help never came, that the others were killed because they’d given up—including her brother, who’d continued to listen and obey.

It was a story Eshe thought about many times.  About whether she would have had the courage to keep trying even when she was scared to death.

She peered back at the door, then quietly padded across the tiled floor until she was facing it.

Did it click?  Or didn’t it?

She was fearful that if the door was still ajar, simply bumping it with her hand could be enough to cause it to lock again, so she carefully raised her hand over the metal handle and, with a deep breath, grasped it tightly in one quick motion and yanked it toward her.

She was shocked when it moved.