“Give me five minutes,” Leah says, and points at the dining table.
I turn and look. Restaurant bags cover most of the table, and the smell hits me before I’ve taken a step. Warm and complicated, several things at once. My feet carry me there.
“I didn’t know what you liked,” Leah calls after me, sounding pleased, “so I brought a little of everything from the diner on the tourist island.”
I stop walking when the front door opens. Kojo and Zaki duck through together, snow on their shoulders, still carrying the cold with them. Kojo’s amber eyes find mine.
I cross the room and walk into his arms without deciding to. My face against his chest, and his arms come around me.
I pull back and look at Zaki. She’s standing with her arms at her sides, watching me, and a place in her face is open that I haven’t seen open before. Not soft, Zaki doesn’t do soft, but open. The relief is there. She’s relieved, grieving.
I wrap my arms around her waist and put my face against her chest, and she goes rigid. Her whole body locks, like she doesn’t know what her hands are supposed to do with this.
“This is not the way of the Bouda,” she says above my head, her voice careful.
“Shut up, Zaki,” I tell her. “Just let me hold you.”
She goes quiet. I can feel her eyes go over my head toward Kade, probably with a look that is asking for help, and Kade is probably shrugging. Zaki’s lost everything she’s ever known. She’s been carrying herself like a gate that never closes, and somebody needs to hold her, and I’m here.
“Well,” Leah says brightly, appearing at Kojo’s elbow with her measuring tape already extended, “since I’ve got you both here, I’ll need your measurements too.”
Zaki makes a sound in her throat that isn’t quite a hiss.
Leah doesn’t flinch, just starts toward Kojo with the tape, unbothered by either of them.
Then, slowly, Zaki’s arm comes around my shoulders. Not obligatory. I feel the exact moment her body stops bracing and just stands, and I don’t say anything about it, and she doesn’t either.
I don’t understand what’s happening to me. But it’s getting harder to pretend I don’t.
