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"You keep an eye on this one, okay?" I said to Artemis, and I went around the bed to try to talk to the other one Like the pixie when she first showed up, this one was terrified, staring off into space ide eyes She kept her hands up as though trying to defend herself When I touched her arm, she curled into herself even more She ducked her head behind her arirls gone through? What one through a bout of PTSD, I could understand the "scared of your own shadow" thing, but nor People didn’t suffer their own ends for eternity Yet these girls seemed stuck in the moments they’d died

I needed a plan First coffee Then Uncle Bob Soirls had been reportedto be in class all day For a second, I actually thought about postponing it, then realized the world would be a safer place with her in that class I couldn’t let the world down

I visited the ladies’ room and sat atopco better – there was nothing like ninety pounds resting on your bladder at dawn – I peeked intoat first The sounds were co them He was a permanent fixture, had been here since I rented the apart in a corner, silent as the , had never evennow

I tiptoed to Sophie, my secondhand sofa, and saw a third woman And while this one was blond as well, she was not a natural blonde She looked Hispanic Around twenty-five But she had the sa in uneven patches as though it had been bleached in a hurry or under duress And she had the same terrified expression Exhibited the sa on? I would never figure it out without a caffeine fix I turned to haveof theabout lots of different things Hethe elixir of life I s, the weather, men Whatever struckabout how I only loved him for his carafe, I realized I had run out of clean cups And dish soap After a quick trip to the bathroom and back, I washed a few cups with shampoo, then reached in the top cabinet for old Nondairy creamer So the fake stuff, but the fake stuff e Reyes’s shower

But when I opened the cabinet, I found another wo that resembled a squeak on a rusty wheel, and clutched ri up unexpectedly Nope It still got ht side, the rush of adrenaline helped Not a lot I still needed a caffeine fix, but at least I ake enough to realize I quite possibly had ht down yonder

I approached the woht my attention I had to look up Up! And there on my as another woman This one looked about thirty She could’ve been a natural blonde Wasn’t sure But she was crawling upShe scurried to a corner and curled into it

I did a 360, turning to assess s, and counted no less that fivestates of terror They were all filthy, all covered in the saled My heart sank for them They couldn’t have all died recently I would have heard so and hairstyles were from different time periods While one looked almost recent with a Faded Glory button-down, another actually looked froo, chunks of her hair pulled into a ponytail with a fluffy neon scrunchy The terror in their eyes, the h ," Cookie said as she walked in, alotten much sleep, and she had a rather nasty shiner

"Hey, you," I said, pretending not to notice I poured her a cup and added all the fixings

"What do you think?"

"What? Oh, you mean your black eye? I hardly noticed"

"Don’t say that," she said with an indignant gasp before pointing at her eye "I earned this puppy I’ to milk it for all it’s worth Amber made me breakfast"

"No way"

"Way And it wasn’t half bad once I picked out the shell fragments"

"Nice" I took a sip of my coffee Smacked my lips Took another sip, then handed it to Cookie "Here, taste this"

She took a sip, then handed it back, s her lips, too "What is that?"

"Not sure Mr Coffee has never let me down" I took another sip "Maybe it’s not him I ran out of dish soap and had to use shampoo I’m not entirely certain I rinsed well"

"You did your dishes with shampoo?"

"It was either that or ood call A little shampoo won’t hurt you"