The Mayor directs us back to the care of Midora, the older blonde guide who’d originally greeted us in the foyer. She carries a large black umbrella and wears heavy black boots under her cotton dress as she leads us to one of the buildings near the city hall. The image of her walking before us in the pouring rain in combat boots and a sundress just seems to accentuate the absurdity of our new reality.

The streets are lined with what were once small businesses the town has now repurposed into living quarters. To my surprise, they’re made out quite comfortably. None of the storepartments have power, but effort has been made to make them livable, at least.

Privacy frost has been sprayed over the street-facing windows. Merchandise has been maneuvered into corners to open living spaces. Furniture is provided—a couch, a folding table and chairs, a queen-sized mattress with sheets and full fittings, and a propane stove and pot for heating food.

Midora explains that everyone who stays has a job. And that we’ll be assigned jobs based on our skill sets and abilities. She is kind. Patient. And answers all my questions without reserve. When I ask her about the guides—or ghosts, as they call them—who live with the mayor in the city hall, she explains they’d been abused by hounds—espers—before coming here and therefore feel safer near the mayor.

And then she leaves.

And we’re alone.

The storepartment we’ve been given was previously a thrift shop. Which feels oddly fortuitous if you disregard the smell of slightly mildewy, aged clothing that permeates everything.

“Nope. Don’t like it,” I say.

I sit at the makeshift dining table, pulling my soggy shoes from my feet.

The kid sits across from me doing the same. The propane space heater they left us is doing little to combat the chill from being soaked. I’ve started a pot of rainwater boiling as well, and the hissing of the water as it heats fills the room.

Having freed both my feet, I sit back in the fold-up chair to rest a beat while I continue my thought.

“Something feels off. My spidey senses are tingling.”

I thought for sure that would get a derisive scoff from the kid, but the joke falls flat in the face of his silent vigil.

His sweatshirt hangs off the back of his chair, dripping onto the floor. His shoes and socks sit in a soggy pile next to him. He’s hunched over, elbows on his knees, and his hair is just long enough to obscure the top half of his face from my scrutiny.

I don’t have to see his face to know he’s still worked up. I can feel it. His vibrations are all off.

“Kid,” I say. Softer this time. More serious. “Things are tough right now because it’s still the beginning. We don’t know what’s going on. There’s no social order to guide us. It could be like this for only a few more weeks. Or it could go on for months. Maybe even years. But that’s okay. Everything will be okay. There’s one thing that we know for sure: in this new world you are designed to be the apex predator. You will be fine. You will survive.”

“Yeah… but what about you?” He finally looks at me. And the expression he gives me is heavy. “We’ve met up with two different groups of people this week and both of them only want to use you. Is this what it will be like from now on? Constantly running for fear that stopping means you get added to some sort of harem?”

I sigh. I don’t want to make light of the kid’s concerns, but where exactly do you start when explaining that systemic oppression of the weak is nothing new in our society?

“Hey, listen to me.” I stand from my chair and move so I’m kneeling before him. “I. Am. Fine. Alright?”

His eyes go wide as he looks down at me. I can feel his waves starting to even out some as the tension begins to leave him.

He nods, then sits up straighter in his chair, trying to put some distance between us as best he can.

“Good. Now finish drying off. We have a roof, just like you wanted. Let’s enjoy it.”

I stand and move to the corner of the room where the clothing racks are lined up and start searching for something dry and comfortable. After a beat, the kid goes back to stripping off the remainder of his wet clothing.

I try not to, but I can’t help but peek through the racks at him, catching small glimpses of skin as he works to pull first his sopping shirt, then his jeans from his lithe frame.

My mouth goes dry and I feel my pulse jump. His back is to me now, but his boxers are soaked too and cling to his skin like, well, a second skin. If he turned around now, I’m certain I’d get a very detailed profile of the rest of him.

“Did you find anything?” he calls over his shoulder.

I slide a section of clothes in front of me, blocking my line of sight to his body. “Not yet.”

I take a second to steady my breathing before I resume my search. Even before the apocalypse, I wasn’t exactly social. I had the occasional one-night stand, but for the most part I kept my private life isolated. My work-life balance was virtually nonexistent, and significant others tended only to complicate things.

Needless to say, it’s been a while. And since I’m with the kid pretty much all the time, I haven’t even had a chance to comfort myself.

I take a deep breath and return to searching the racks in earnest. I manage to find a couple pairs of sweatpants and a couple hoodies. We can do a more thorough search later, but these are enough to get us out of our wet clothes for now.

I toss a hoodie and a pair of pants across the room at him and remain behind the racks to change. Stepping into the dry clothes, even thrifted and unwashed, is euphoric.

Gathering my wet clothes, I rejoin the kid just as he’s pulling his hoodie over his head. We makeshift a drying rack and I set to heating a couple cans of chicken noodle soup over the propane stove.

It’s quiet but comfortable between us. The sound of rain dulled by the enclosed space. The kid goes through our bags and sets to hanging more stuff to dry; our spare clothing, sleeping bags, even our hammocks and the bags themselves need to be hung to dry. Camping in the rain is seriously no fun.

“How long do you think we’ll stay here?” he asks finally.

I poke at the can I’m heating as I consider. “Not sure. Maybe a week. With more people here it should be easier to go under the radar for longer. And it’s going to take a few days for our gear to dry out completely.”

He lets out a breath but doesn’t say anything in response. I guess the road had really been wearing on him. I feel kind of bad I hadn’t noticed earlier.

“There’s definitely something strange going on,” I continue. “But if they don’t bother us with it, then there’s no reason to be bothered by it. Just stay alert and don’t stick your nose in anyone else’s business.”

The kid nods. “At least there are more guides here. I was beginning to wonder if maybe there weren’t that many out there.”

I bring the heated cans to the table along with mugs of the freshly boiled water. The kid is already seated and takes the food gratefully when I offer it.

I cast him a curious glance. “Was that something you were worried about?”

He shrugs. “Not worried. But. Yeah. Kinda.”

He doesn’t elaborate and I don’t press further.

“It is odd, though, that it seems like so far we’ve only seen women guides, other than you.”

I frown. I had noticed that too, but I had honestly just chalked it up to straight men being picky about only having women guides.

“And have you noticed their hair? It seems like only the hair at their temples turned. But you—everything went white.” His eyes are on my hair, examining it even as he describes it.

“It’s probably just because my hair was short to begin with.” I take a bite of my soup.

“But even your eyebrows and your eyelashes turned. That’s not the case with the other guides. It’s only the strands at their temples.”

I really hadn’t noticed. But I’m also not usually looking at myself. Suppose it’s more obvious to the kid who has been staring at my white hair every day now.

I shrug. “Maybe it’s because I’m a man.”

He taps his spoon to his lips as he considers this. “Would it really be because of something so arbitrary as sex? It seems like it would make more sense if it was because you’d awakened as a strong guide.”

“Oh, so now you’re the guideverse expert?”

He blushes but goes back to eating his soup. “Not at all, but… I just have a feeling that it means something. Of course, we can’t know for sure unless we test it. There are plenty of guides here. Maybe I can see if one of them can heal me or something so I can see if it feels different to when you did it.”

The suggestion isn’t a terrible one. But I hate it anyway. The immediate distaste that rises in me at the suggestion is unexpected.

Mina mentioned possessive espers, but she didn’t say anything about covetous guides.

Maybe I’m reading too much into it. After all, it’s a bad idea for more than the fact that I hate it.

“Absolutely not,” I say flatly.

He tries to hide his laughter.

“Why are you laughing? I literally just told you to keep your nose out of other people’s business. I have a feeling the guides are a sensitive topic here. You should avoid being alone with any of them at any time—and don’t talk to any of them,” I add. “In fact, don’t talk to anyone.”

He’s wearing a small smile now as he gazes at me from behind his eyelashes. “You’re the possessive type, huh?”

“Kid—” I sigh.

“I don’t mind. Really. But if you’re gonna keep me on such a short leash, maybe you can at least give me a little taste?” He’s batting his eyes at me.

Under the table, his bare foot slides along my ankle and up my shin. The unexpected forwardness catches me off guard, sends a shiver through me.

I close my eyes and take a deep breath. He might be acting like he’s trying to seduce me. But I know that’s not what he’s actually after.

“Kid, I told you already. You don’t need it.”

He pouts but—thankfully—removes his foot from the inside of my thigh.

“It’s just…” He rubs a hand on the back of his neck. “I feel like that first time I didn’t get to appreciate it fully. I was so out of it at the time. I thought the pain would consume me. And then it was just… gone. I was so relieved I blacked out. But I don’t remember any of it.”

I bite my lip. It’s true that when I found him, he’d nearly been consumed with his awakening. But the fact of the matter is that he doesn’t really need to remember how it went down or what it felt like. It’s not necessary. He’s fine without knowing and, honestly, maybe it’s better for him if he doesn’t know.

He’s watching me as I think. I don’t notice at first, but when I look up again his eyes are on me.

“You know something.”

“Of course, I know something. I was the one who saved you, after all.”

“No, it’s more than that. You’re not just being stingy. There’s something else, isn’t there?”

Oh shit.

“You know, Mina is a guide but her brother still needed help. Why wouldn’t she have been able to help him?”

Oh shit, oh shit.

“Maybe there’s more to it than just using your power on me. You keep telling me it’s not healing. So, what is it? Come to think of it, I don’t even remember how you managed to calm me down that first time. What exactly did you do?”

The question lands between us like the final toll in a church bell right before an execution.

My execution.

“God, kid. I really wish you hadn’t asked me that.”