She picked up a magazine from the table in front of her. “Ten Ways to Redecorate Your Bloodstone Circle.” “How to Lose Weight Without Losing Sight of Your Own Mortality.” “A Cake Recipe That Only People Who Hate Our Government Will Want to Try So Mail Us Your Best Pictures of Making It and We Will Take You Away.” Boring stuff like that, but diverting in the few minutes it took the mayor to be ready for her.

The elderly man rapped softly on his desk to get her attention and then gestured with an open palm toward the door.

“Thanks, man. You’re my favorite person I’ve talked to all day.”

He shrugged, turning back to the stairs and leaving her to the business of opening the door, which was tricky. It was one of those ones that required some mild bleeding.

“Ugh,” she said as she entered the office. “There I am like an idiot thinking Push. No, pull. And I forgot entirely to just Bleed. There should be a sign or something.”

The mayor, Dana Cardinal, was sitting in a portrait of official grandeur that had to be posed, her silhouette against the picture windows, and the light falling on the desk, and the papers spread out amid light and shadow. It was all perfectly staged to present her authority.

“I happen to agree, but try to get anything done in this building,” said the mayor.

“Sure, yeah. Didn’t mean you were doing anything wrong.”

“Yes you did. It’s perfectly fine. If we cannot be judged on our actions, then we cannot be judged. And let me tell you.” The mayor turned to face her and leaned her elbows upon the desk. “We can be judged. We definitely can. So, Jackie, you came to see me. Is something troubling you?”

Jackie sat down in the chair across the desk from the mayor and did the trick with the paper. On the floor. Back in her hand. Torn to pieces. Back in her hand. Mentally willed into flames. Back in her hand. The mayor nodded gravely, not appearing surprised.

“Yeah. So,” Jackie said. “But that’s just part of it. Here’s something else: I’m not sure I’ve ever been to my mother’s house. She asked me if I remember my childhood and I don’t. I don’t, Dana.”

Jackie threw the paper in the hand-carved oak wastebasket next to the mayor’s desk. The paper wad caught the rim and then rolled in. Jackie laid the paper in her hand down on the desk. “I can’t write anything but ‘KING CITY.’ I can’t think of anything else,” she said. “Guess I gotta go there, but no one seems to think I should or even would be able to do that.”

The mayor smiled a smile of comfort, not happiness. She looked out the window at the rapidly diminishing day.