I spend lunch outside, sitting on the front steps numb. Relieved. Alone.

Until Michael comes out.

I know it’s him without turning around. He shuts the door carefully and hesitates before sitting next to me, his side brushing against mine. I can’t look at him at first.

“Liz told me everything,” he says.

And then I know that it’s okay.

I press my forehead against his shoulder. He exhales slowly. It’s quiet. Postwar quiet.

Later, we’ll try to make sense of this. Eventually, the bruises will fade.

But for now, he reaches over and puts his hand on top of my hand, curling his fingers into the spaces between mine, closing them around my palm until they’re laced tightly, locked together, school behind us, and I realize Anna is right.

A whole world exists outside of that hellhole.