“Savannah?”
My entire body tightened again.
A teenage girl stood near the lemonade stall, staring at me with both hands over her mouth.
Beside her, another girl was already lifting a phone.
Jen had not said anything.
She had not needed to.
Recognition spread through crowds without permission.
The first phone pointed toward us.
Then a second.
“Oh,” Ellie said.
It was a small word.
A very Ellie word.
It somehow contained the whole problem.
The smile returned to my face.
The teenage girls approached at a speed just short of running.
“I’m sorry,” one of them said breathlessly. “Are you really—”
“Yes.”
Both girls screamed.
Not arena screaming.
Market screaming.
Higher. More concentrated. Dangerous around glassware.
People turned.
The man selling honey looked up. The wooden-bowl negotiator stopped mid-sentence. Two women near a jewelry stall whispered to each other.
One phone became five.
I could feel the situation expanding.
Ellie moved closer to me.
Not touching.
Close.
“Do we run?” she asked quietly.
“Not yet.”
