It’s bad enough that she’s reliving the trauma of the first flight, but she can put all that behind her as long as she’s in motion, as long as she’s moving forward. Her time with Valentino is already so limited and she’s not just talking about how his End Day is halfway done. Scarlett and Valentino were supposed to see each other through long, full lives, and that’s being robbed from them. Scarlett doesn’t even know what she will do with Valentino when she arrives, what even has to get done besides spending time together, but she simply wants to be in New York figuring that out with him already.

Scarlett cannot believe this day.

Why is the plane still grounded?

What’s going on this time?

Haven’t the pilots been cleared? Or are they not registered for Death-Cast?

She’s about to join the chorus of passengers in bothering the flight attendants for some answers when one of the pilots addresses everyone.

“Attention, passengers. I have some news.”

Deep in her heart, as if Death-Cast is calling, Scarlett knows—she just knows.

Orion

2:37 p.m.

Valentino and I are becoming inseparable, as if we’re the living, breathing versions of our inscribed name back on the Brooklyn Bridge—ValentinOrion, all one word, the O bigger because it belongs to both of us. If I’m not holding his hand because he’s taking pictures of Times Square, I’m touching his shoulder or hooking my finger through his belt loop. It’s like I’ll float away if we lose contact. More like he will, I guess.

We’re holding hands as we walk through Times Square, back toward the area where people were telling their Death-Cast origin stories. Where I first met Valentino. The stage I never got to stand on is gone, but the red glass benches remain as a new fixture, tons of people sitting there.

“Okay, so I was pretty bummed out by not getting to tell my story, but then you walked past me and I was . . . I was into you from the jump.”

“That fast?” Valentino asks.

“That fast. Did you think I was a total weirdo for saying what’s up?”

“No, I thought you were cute too. And I actually spotted you first.”

“Wait. What?”

“I was just walking through the Square—”

“No one calls it that!”

“Well, start that trend in my honor.”

“I’ll hate it, but okay. Go on. Tell me how you thought I was cute as fuck as you were walking through the Square.”

“I was walking through the Square, and that Death-Cast presentation caught my eye—”

“And then I did too!”

“Do you want to tell the story of how I thought you were cute or do you want me to?”

“Are you for real asking a storyteller if he wants to tell—”

“Anyway, I saw you—”

“But you didn’t say hi!”