He leaves. I stand there for another second in the corridor, feeling the last bit of solid ground under me shift.
Inside my room, the red on the notice looks brighter.
RECLAIM REVIEW PENDING.
I sit on my bed and press both hands over my mouth hard enough to hurt. My whole body feels thin. Too light. Too used up.
I think about the men in the alley. The supervisor outside the processing line. The women in the doorway. Mrs. Talan begging not to have her children put out. Hunger. Rent.
I sit there for a long time.
Then someone knocks once and pushes the door open before I answer.
Marai.
She steps inside holding a folded bag that smells faintly of spice and yeast.
“Got extra flatbread from a client who changed his order,” she says. “Take it before I eat it myself.”
I just stare at her.
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can.” She drops it beside me on the bed. “You look like if you miss one more meal, you’ll pass out in the hall.”
My hand closes around the warm bag before my pride can stop it. The smell hits me so hard my eyes sting.
“Thank you.”
Marai leans against the wall and watches me tear off a piece too fast. I shove it in my mouth and almost choke on it. My body wants to inhale it. I force myself to chew it instead of swallowing it whole.
“You need a contract,” she says after a minute. “A real one. Something off-world if you can get it.”
I swallow.
“Off-world.”
“There’s a program posting in the market.” She shrugs. “I saw it this morning. Alien matches. Some kind of marriage placement.”
An ugly laugh slips out of me.
“That sounds insane.”
Marai doesn’t smile.
“So does starving here.”
The room goes quiet. I tear off another piece of bread and look down at it. Marriage to an alien male. Off-world. The words feel ridiculous in my head. Too strange. Too far away. Likesomething meant for other women. Women with better choices than me.
“I’m not saying to do it,” Marai says, softer now. “I’m saying go take a look and see what it is about.”
After she leaves, the room feels too quiet. I eat every crumb. Then lick the salt from my fingers because wasting any of it feels almost sinful.
I look at the red notice on the wall. Then the dim ceiling. Then nothing. Alien marriage. Off-world. It sounds insane. But so does standing in an alley while strange men decide how hungry I look. So does waiting to be locked out of my room.
By the time I lie down, still fully dressed because the room is too cold and my mind won’t let me sleep anyway, I’ve gone over the same thought enough times that it doesn’t feel impossible anymore. Not likely. Not safe. But possible.
Tomorrow I’ll go look at the posting. Not because I want adventure. Because Mars is starting to feel like a trap with no doors left open.
