To our left, Tess spoke again. “If they open your cage, don’t go with your feet under you. Dead weight’s heavier.”
“Noted,” I said.
“How long have you been here?” Ariel asked, voice shaky.
“About a week, I think,” Tess said. “Hard to tell.”
“How are we getting out of here?” Ariel asked me.
“I’m figuring that out now, little one.”
“You’ve never called me that,” Ariel said with a small chuckle.
“Now I do.”
She made a noise that wasn’t quite a protest. I chased the chill line of a tear with my thumb from my side of the steel.
We listened to the world above do ordinary things in terrible ways. Footsteps went by and didn’t come down. Water ran for thirty seconds, not long enough to fill anything. A chair scraped floor. A phone vibrated on wood and didn’t get answered. Music came and went.
The cough to our right steadied. Not a good steady. A tired steady. Sunshine shifted once. Her chains didn’t drag. That told me the length. Enough to stand. Not enough to reach the door. Same as ours.
My headache pulsed behind my right eye. If I had a concussion, it was mild. The nausea had ebbed. Balance back. I could use that. I rolled my shoulder, took inventory. Left elbow barked. Right ribs screamed. Nothing that mattered long-term.
“Cap,” Ariel whispered. “If they come, I’m not sure I can be brave like you.”
“You’re brave like you,” I said.
“That’s not the same.”
“It is. You breathe. You listen. You help me count. You use your teacher voice when I need it.”
“My what?”
“The one that makes even me sit up straight.”
She huffed. “You don’t sit straight for anyone.”
“I do for you.”
That made her quiet.
I leaned my cheek to the wire opposite hers, let myself remember the first night she touched my jaw without asking. I’d gone to her place angry at a world I couldn’t punch. She didn’t try to fix the world. She looked at the scar by my ear like it was a landmark and asked what hurricane carved it, and I told her. She traced it like a map could be loved. First time I thought about staying. I carried that night into the dark now and set it between the cages like a candle that didn’t need flame.
We sat with the dark. I let the silence fill my head like water. Then I shaped it.
“Tess,” I said. “Any idea how many men they’ve got?”
“I’ve seen three,” she said. “Heard more upstairs.”
“Are we the only ones down here?” I asked Juno.
“No,” she said. “I think there’s someone else in the cages, but they haven’t said much. They pulled a girl up before you two were thrown in. She hasn’t been back.”
Sunshine let out a little wheeze like she was trying to speak. “Sunshine,” I said softly. “You keep breathing like you’re stubborn. That’s an order.”
Ariel squeezed my fingers through the seam. “You sound like you think you’re in charge.”
“I am,” I said.
