Page 8 of One Adult, Please

My left leg starts tingling.

Not now.

The pins and needles spread through my calf, sharp little electrical pops that make every muscle want to twitch. I lock my knee. Curl my toes inside my shoe. Inform my entire lower body that betrayal will not be tolerated until further notice.

The gray man reaches Brenda.

One hand lands on her shoulder. His fingers drag through her blue hair, pulling strands of fiber-optic cable loose with a brittle snapping sound.

His head jerks toward it. Fast.

Every part of him has been slow until now.

He surges into the gap.

I grab the first thing my hand finds inside the tote and throw it toward the door.

One of my four-dollar water bottles smacks the far door with a crack and drops beside it.

The gray man's head whips toward the sound.

He turns away from me so abruptly that his shoulder knocks Brenda sideways on her mount. Then he goes after the bottle, fast for three stumbling steps before his body loses the instructions again. He hits the door face-first, claws at it, and pushes through.

The door swings shut behind him.

I don't move. I don't breathe.

Brenda's torn blue hair hangs across my face.

"Thank you," I whisper.

I sit between Brenda and Sheila and I count to sixty in my head, except I lose the numbers at forty-seven, so I start over and make it all the way through the second time.

My left leg is fully numb. The pins and needles have escalated to a full electrical protest.

I try to stand up. My left leg says absolutely not. My right leg says I'll do my best but don't expect miracles. I topple sideways off the platform.

My shoulder hits Sheila's tail. Sheila doesn't move because she's a professional. But the vibration travels down the platform and knocks a decorative starfish off its mount at the end of the row. It hits the floor with a clatter that sounds, in this silence, roughly equivalent to a cannon.

I freeze, listening for the sudden scrape of feet beyond the far door.

Nothing.

"Sorry," I whisper to the starfish.

It doesn't accept my apology. It just lies there on the floor, judging me with its five arms and zero facial features.

My leg tingles back to life. I collect my tote bag, purse, stabby fork, and what remains of my dignity, which fits in a very small container.

I stand up and look at the starfish on the floor, the door the not-a-man-anymore walked through, and Brenda and Sheila who witnessed everything and will tell no one because they're the only trustworthy beings I've encountered today.

"Thank you for your service," I tell them. "You were excellent friends. I'll come back for you."

I pick up the starfish and put it back on the platform because even in the apocalypse we clean up after ourselves.

Then I go to the door. The third one, the one I haven't tried, because my survival strategy has officially evolved from "find a dark room with more than one door" to "use the door nothing horrible has walked through yet."

I open it.