smokeSCREEN: book5IVE

"Yeah." We sit at the table and I ignore manners, shoveling down food for a few minutes before finding a cigarette and sighing. "How long was I out?"

"Three days," he says.

"I had a dream that you wanted to talk about something?"

He nods.

"Have you looked outside?"

"The snow's melting."

"And in about a week we'll be out of cigarettes," he nods.

"What do you suggest?" He's cleaning up – I like watching him do dishes too, for some reason.

I'm finding another cigarette. And I'm wondering where Douglas is.

"I suggest we go back," he says.

"Why is it so hot in here?" I'm fanning myself with a book. "Go back where?"

"To the city. Then south."

I pause. I'm thinking.

"No – we should stay. It's time we quit smoking, anyway."

"I was a soldier for Westwood. Then I met the Floor Thirteen girls. Then I fall for you. And my priorities are always changing," he says. My brow furrows. My eyes narrow.

"Are you breaking up with me?"

"No – I don't want my priorities to keep changing. And as far as I'm concerned, Westwood turned their back on me – I was up for grabs and the Tower took me in. Then I promise to be true to my floor. Then the Tower sells me out. I'm not happy with Lisa right now. Or Michelle.

But Sophie doesn't deserve to be captured by the Tower."

"Yeah, and for all we know she's dead," I snap. I'm getting agitated.

"She's not," he shakes his head. "Very few are."

"And how do you know that?"

"I've been doing some deep meditation."

"You can't go more than a couple of miles," I remind him. "You can barely get to the train tracks when you're meditating."

But he holds up his hand. He fingers The Ring, and says;

"I can now."

* * *

And so we get out our old packs. We throw our old gear into them, and I'm terrified of him.

He told me he hadn't gone looking for it. He told me as soon as I showed up that night, Douglas darted out into the woods – didn't come back 'till that afternoon, the ring in her mouth.

He says he just stared at it for a long, long time. Hours. But he felt strong enough. He put it on. And he hasn't felt a sniff of Drac. He is in control.

Or so he says.

He still seems like him. He plays with Douglas, he's always smiling and he always knows what to say. And as we hike out over the melting snow towards the trolley we left the previous fall, we pull out our sunglasses against the harsh light.

"What do you think?" he says, stopping to look at me. Douglas is off investigating something. I want to look at his eyes, but I'm looking at the staff strapped to his back. If Cypress isn't in control, he might kill me.

But if that were the case, I suppose he would have killed me by now.

"Dark throughts," he sighs. I cock my head at him, with a worried look. "Let's move on."

And I take a moment to follow, as he starts up the next hill without me.

I've lost him.