Her voice was taking on a wobbly cadence like she was finally drifting off to sleep.

“You’ll have me,” Ashley said. “It’s hard to get rid of me.”

“Yeah, but…” Kenzie said. It took her a while to summon up the thoughts. It seemed like fatigue more than anything. “…People go away. They die. So I think of you and I feel better, but then I think what if something happens, and I feel worse again. Then I start thinking… better tinker. If I make better stuff I can protect all of you.”

“I’ve died a bunch of times and I’m still here.”

“Yeah. But don’t want to stretch that until it snaps,” Kenzie mumbled. “Mm. Don’t let me fall asleep. I need to keep an eye out.”

“You need to sleep. We’ll manage.”

“It’s unfair, you know. Because being around you all like this and networking into the others through Darlene, Aiden sleeping in a cot in Darlene’s room and Candy sleeping in a beanbag chair in her room… is when I feel the least like I’m going to end up alone and I feel the most like I can sleep easy… but I should watch for trouble, I shouldn’t sleep.”

“You should. Shh,” Ashley said. “Rest.”

Kenzie twisted around, curling up closer and wrapping her arms around Ashley’s thigh, where Ashley sat cross-legged next to her. She squeezed and smushed her face tight against Ashley’s leg.

“Chicken has a snot bubble in his left nostril. It’s clicking rapid-fire every time he breathes out,” Kenzie said. “There needs to be a camera that captures moments like that, and all of the feelings around that moment.”

“Go to sleep,” I said. “We’ll see if you snore and put a smile on Darlene’s face.”

As I said it, I saw some people walking through the hallway in the dark. They paused as they saw us.

Six, seven people. Men and women, all silhouettes in the dark. People came in wearing whatever clothes they had that were allowed, and those clothes were a kind of status symbol. People inevitably had to start wearing the shitty prison uniforms after a time, and so that marked a kind of veteran status. But the people who were veterans and had any kind of clout or standing were those who’d migrated into wearing the prison uniforms but had other clothing worn as part of their outfit, the more tattered the better.

Shirts with patterns had sleeves tied together and were worn around the shoulder or waist. Dresses torn up and wound around hair or worn as wide hoods that extended from shoulder, over the head, to shoulder.