KAIRA

"Anything wrong?" Ryna asked.

I shook my head and took a breath, then kept walking. The three of us moved together through the open air and away from the entrance, and I kept my eyes forward the way you do when you are very deliberately not looking at something. It worked, my chest did not cooperate as well as my eyes did, but that was a separate problem.

We got back to the room about four minutes later. Jessica dropped her bag on her bed and I could tell she had thoughts and was deciding whether or not to say them.

I sat on my bed and stared at...