A mask, or a helmet. Eyeless, in a way, with a flat pane extending from the eyes, over her nose, down to a pointed chin. Three round lenses were placed along the line of her eyebrows, one round lens was on each cheekbone, and she had two spherical attachments, much like the buns she tended to wear her hair in. Probably intended to fit over the buns.

“I like it better than the one you wore for the training exercise,” I said. “It does make me think of a spider, with all of the eyes.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

“I don’t think you make me think ‘spider’ at all. It’s a bit too inhuman. What if… can I draw? I don’t want to ruin your drawing.”

“Go ahead. Use my pen. Squint one eye when you want it to draw.”

The countdown timers marked Ashley’s departure from the train. The ‘walk time’ timer was highlighted and started counting down.

I tried my hand at drawing little triangles at the side of each of the round lenses. A tiny triangle to represent eyelashes.

“Oh, cute!” Kenzie said. “Can you draw a second, smaller one? And leave off the eyelashes on the cheekbones, because I’m doing something different there, and—”

“Here,” I said. I passed her the pen.

She began to change things, keeping all but two of the eyelashes I’d drawn.

Someone labeled ‘[Joe]’ walked down the street, a bag slung over his shoulder. He entered the same bar I’d encountered Moose outside of. The one where Snag and Love Lost had gone inside.

I looked at some of the other names.

“Fifi?” I asked.

“Huh?” Kenzie asked. She looked up, and I pointed at a blonde girl with hair that looked like she’d just about destroyed it with bleaching. Frizzed out to the point I doubted she could get a comb through it. She’d resorted to using a headband and hair tie to try to get it in order. The headband and hair tie didn’t match her outfit.

“Oh. She looked like a Fifi. I named some of the ones I see a lot.”

“She does look vaguely poodle-ish, and Fifi seems like a poodle name to me.”

“Exactly,” Kenzie said, with satisfaction. She returned to writing down something that looked like code and formula, periodically poking her pen at her projected image of her mask.

I looked at ‘Fifi’. “Poor her. When I was a little younger than you are now, I tried dying my hair to be like my cousin, and it went badly. I was so inconsolable.”

“What happened after?” Kenzie asked.