Page 115 of The Glass Girl

Carefully, she puts them on the floor and bends forward, sliding them far back under the bed. Then she lies down.

I’m getting drowsy. I close my eyes.

—

A siren blaring makes me bolt off the bed, confused, my ears hurting.

Gideon yells, “Down, get down! Runner!”

I slam myself onto the concrete floor, press my cheek to its coolness.

The four of us look at each other on the floor.

I look toward the open door. Josh is flat on the floor in the hallway, his face turned to me, his parents looking down at him in horror.

Holly,he mouths.

Day Sixteen

It’s 2:04 a.m. andwe are all still awake in our beds.

We haven’t left since this afternoon. No one is allowed to leave their room unless a staff member accompanies them, even to go to the bathroom.

The police came and questioned us.

What was she wearing?

All black, like always.

How did she seem? Happy? Sad?

She’s always sad. Look around at where we are. But she seemed hopeful. Her people were coming.

(They did not come.)

Did she ever mention any friends or places she liked to go?

She scored drugs on First Avenue and Fort Lowell.

Did she say she was planning to leave?

She said we’d be friends when she got out. She was going to draw us.

Can you describe her mental frame of mind in the past few days?

She’s been upset. She’s had a bad life. Read her file, man.

(Tell, but just enough tonot tell.)

They took her suitcase, her bedsheets (I don’t know why), her pillow, her blue wool blanket, her toiletry bag.

(She’s coming back, don’t take those.)

Miss, let us do our job.

Gideon finally speaks.

“It’s really cold out there,” she says. “The last I saw her in the activity room, she was just wearing her long jersey shirt.”

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