Harrison sniffs. “So they can save us?”

“Yeah.” Cary nods. “We’ll be saved.”

“And that’s your expert opinion?” Trace asks.

Cary shrugs but he doesn’t look Trace in the eyes, focusing instead on the doors. His expression reveals nothing, but he’s turning the phone in his hands faster now, clumsily.

“It just makes sense,” he says.

“That’s what you said about coming here. That really paid off for me and Grace.”

Cary winces.

“He got the rest of us here,” Rhys says.

There were eight of us, before.

“Oh, so I’m here. Hey, Grace!” Trace turns to her. “You’re here. We’re here with Cary Chen.” He laughs bitterly. “You think that means anything to us when—”

“Trace, stop.” Grace sounds just broken enough that Trace doesn’t take it any further. He frowns, holds out his hand to Cary and says, “Give me back my fucking phone.”

Cary stares at it like he doesn’t want to give it up, like Trace’s cell phone is an anchor keeping him here but I don’t know why anyone would want to be anchored here.

“Now,” Trace says.

Cary holds it out and finally looks Trace in the eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he says, “about your parents.”

Trace rips the phone from Cary’s grasp.

I close my eyes and imagine this place under totally normal circumstances. We have assemblies here. The principal gives speeches here. We eat in this room at lunch. I imagine a day, any school day, setting up the lunch tables and getting in line, picking from the menu. I can almost smell the food …

But then the noises outside get louder than anything I can imagine. They pump through my veins, speed up my heart, and remind me to be afraid even though I have never stopped being afraid, not since Lily left. I open my eyes at the same time the whole barricade seems to shift. Rhys rushes to it, pushing against the desks and tables until they’re settled again.

“What was that?” Harrison asks. “Why did it—”

“It’s just the way this desk was—it wasn’t the door—”

“It’s the door?”

“It wasn’t the door. Just calm down, Harrison. Jesus.”

Harrison starts to cry. He stands in the middle of the room and holds himself because no one else will and it’s the loneliest thing I’ve ever seen. I’d go to him, maybe, but I don’t even know Harrison. None of us do. He’s one of those invisible freshmen made even more invisible by the fact he just moved here four weeks ago. Cary had to ask him his name after we found him trapped under a bike with his jeans caught in the spokes.

Things I know about Harrison now: not only is he short and stocky, he also cries. A lot. Grace takes pity on him because she’s better than I’ll ever be. She wraps her arm around him and murmurs gentle-sounding words at him and I watch his sobs slowly turn to gasps that turn into pathetic little hiccups. Everyone else averts their eyes. They find things to do so they don’t have to watch. I watch because I don’t know what else to do. I watch until I can’t anymore. I dig my hand into my pockets. My fingers curl around a crumpled piece of paper.