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“Can’t she stop?” I ask

“If she fails to wash her hands seven tier says

“What?” I snap “That’s crazy”

“Coer says

He is not indifferent, that’s the thing His too-near voice that see in my ear is held to a standard of cool detachment, but his eyes and his mouth and his forehead and the way he ss all speak of reflected pain

He understands He feels I’m convinced of that at least There’s a hue—there’s so flesh and blood there as well That reassures et upon waking, but still I am relieved

It is still a dream What else could it be? I wake in a field with ame, and then, all of this?

Wait, had I fallen asleep? I try to recall, I strain to dredge soain it is as if all I can see oflife is a sort of clip art version, a stock photo version with generic people acting generically, none of it possessing the detail and grain of reality

Sains her sixth round

“Is this why—”

“Many things are why,” Messenger says “But this is for our deeper understanding”

Why do we need to understand? I want to ask him that, I want to deood reason why es beforeout her tarot cards But all of Messenger’s ansere vague, and after all, was there a point in asking ithin a dream? Eventually I would wake up, and then I could consider theof it all Calmly, coolly, with the sick sadness of it all pushed aside and relabeled as nothing ery conjured from an overtired mind

We were no longer in Sah school; of that I was sure Almost

A banner on the wall of the corridor read CARLSBAD HIGH SCHOOL—GO SPARTANS The colors were old The colors at my school were

What were they? I was sure I was in high school, and sure that this was not it Why couldn’t I remember my school colors?