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“Yeah,” Rio says “But there’s a fireplace” Wood and kindling have been piled in the fireplace, and Rio drops to her knees and sets about lighting it with her

Zippo “There you go”

“Did you open the flue?” Frangie asks, as sins to fill the small room

“The what?”

Frangie reaches past her to an iron knob set in the wall that opens the flue Smoke swirls then is sucked up the chimney

“We’re here for tonight and toht”

Frangie and Rio are easy together, having a long acquaintance Rainy is also slightly known to both of them from Tunisia, but this Rainy is soence sergeant they’d known back then This Rainy is polite but quiet Andis quite real to her, as if she’s sleepwalking

They toss their bags onto the floor, and Rio excuses herself to the bathroom down the hall

Rainy sits on the edge of one bed and belatedly says, “I could take the floor”

“We could draw lots,” Frangie suggests, wishing the whole ht in a white pub with thite woressive and maybe a little bold It also feels very insecure—either of these two could tell her to get out, to find soo sleep in the park, if they chose to

Harder has lectured her on the internalization of anti-Negro feeling She had daydreah most of that, like most of his lectures, but bits and pieces of what he’s said have stuck She can’t deny that she’s doing just what he said: unconsciously collaborating in our own oppression But at the same time, there’s a question of fairness—she knows little of what Rainy has endured, but suffering is all over the Jewish girl’s face Her eyes, which Frangie recalls being alert with a questing intelligence, are still intense, but now there’s sohtens Frangie a little In any event, Rainy Schulterood sleep

As for Rio Richlin? The freckle-faced far is still there, soh soldier she’s becoe seeie’s not even put off by the fact that even noith the three of them in fresh-pressed class-A uniforh

Rio has changed, but Rainy is almost a different person

Soirl

Rio returns froreat satisfaction “Civilization”