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“I can’t,” Signy said. “I can’t stop.” She looked at Arlo’s scrubs, their tablet, their nurse’s badge. “You understand this. I know you understand this. People need me. I cannot let them slip. I cannot stop.” Jonathan’s heart rate. Vincent’s pain levels. Maisie’s kids. Cora.

Cora.

“Listen to me,” Arlo said. “You are clearly not stupid, but you would be, if you do nothing. If they catch you—when they catch you—they’ll drain your savings account. You might get jail time. You are definitely not keeping whatever licenses you have, you will definitely not be able to pay rent on your shop—”

“I’m well aware of the consequences, thank you.”

“Either way, you’re not going to be able to do this anymore. You might as well dodge the worst of it.”

This wasn’t happening, Signy thought. It wasn’t—she couldn’t—“My friend is dying,” she said, her voice coming out strange and strangled. “Do you understand? My friend is dying, I can’t—” She pressed her knuckles against her eyes. “I can’t be having this right now. My friend is dying.”

“He is,” Nurse Arlo said, softly speaking fact. “And he loves you so much. So how about you keep his friend safe, hmm? Because that’s why he wants your company right now. Not because of what you make for him, but because he loves you. This is your exit. You have to take it.”

Signy was still crying on the couch when Cora walked through the front door with her arms full of groceries an unknowable amount of time later. Cora didn’t waste time in asking what was wrong. She dropped the bags onto the chicory table and threw her arms around Signy fiercely. Signy sank into the respite of being held as she tried to choke back the sobs she didn’t want Otto to hear. She rooted herself in Cora’s arms, and in the protective chant of words that fell in between the kisses planted across her hair, her forehead, her temples. “Hey, it’s okay. It’s okay, it’s okay. I’ve got you. I’m here. I’ve got you.”

Chapter 45 Cora, Fortune

Mushroom lasagna, Cora nodded to herself. She’d bought enough groceries for a few days, and she was gonna start with mushroom lasagna. It was filling, it was cozy, it made a lot of food. Everything had gone to shit, and she didn’t know what she was gonna do about her meds, but in the immediate right-fucking-now, everybody in this apartment needed dinner. Cora couldn’t make that happen as well as Otto could, but she could do it, and so goddammit, there was gonna be mushroom lasagna.

She tied Otto’s apron around her waist, plugged the memory stick labeled RECIPES into whoever’s tablet she’d found lying on the kitchen counter, and began to chop onions, because she figured it was better to get the tears out now.

She’d moved on to basil and garlic by the time Darcy wandered in. Cora didn’t know Otto’s flatmate well, but she’d never seen him like this—no makeup, no glitter, no smile. Haggard and empty from tip to toe. “Can I help?” he asked.

Cora knocked haphazard bits of basil into a pile with the edge of her knife. Otto did it so much nicer. “Nah, I’ve got it,” she said.

“Oh, good,” Darcy sighed. “I didn’t really want to.”

Cora pointed at the fridge. “There’s beer, there’s Hop Pop, and there’s chocolate pudding,” she said. “Choose your poison.”

Without another word, Darcy helped himself to a beer and a pudding cup. He glanced at Cora’s work as he fetched a bottle opener and a spoon from the cutlery drawer. “You should take it,” he said. Cora didn’t know what he meant until she followed his nod to the memory stick. “He’d want you to have it.”

“Oh, no,” Cora said. She shook her head. “No, I—I can’t.”

“Sure you can,” Darcy said. “You just stick it in your pocket.”

Normally a smart-ass reply like that would’ve gotten a chuckle out of Cora, but she was too busy balking. “No, seriously, one of you should have it.”

“Do you see any of the rest of us cooking? Ever?”

“That’s not the point. I’m not—”

Darcy put a hand on one of his hips and shot her a glare that would’ve glassed ash. “You’re making a fucking casserole in his kitchen while he’s on his deathbed,” he said. “You’re family.”

Chapter 46 Signy, Fortune

They started to take shifts. Signy sat with him until midnight, listening to old episodes of Saturday Spectacular. She wasn’t really paying attention to it, and she didn’t know if he could hear. Signy had asked her mother, once, if it was true that your sense of hearing was the last thing to go when you died. “That’s what they say,” her mother had replied. “But it’s hard to ask dead people to confirm your findings.”

The end credits theme faded out, and the episode came to an end. Signy started to go put another one on, but instead, she remained in her chair. She took Otto’s hand, lying on top of the blanket. He was colder than he’d been an hour ago, but his chest still moved up and down. “I’ve never had many friends,” she said to him, not sure of where the words were coming from. “I’ve never been very good at it. I can take care of people, but . . . that’s not really the same. And I don’t know what I’m supposed to say to you now. I haven’t done this part before. I’ve thought sometimes about what I would’ve said to my mother, but I never knew what to talk to her about even when she was alive, so maybe it’s better that we skipped it.” She sniffed, once, grimly. “You . . . are such a good person. You’re such a beautiful person. And the world is going to be so stupid without you in it, but it’s okay to let go. It’s okay to be done. We all have to be done, at some point. I don’t want you to hurt from hanging on.” Signy closed her eyes angrily. Whatever she was saying, she was saying it all wrong. She was fucking it up. She was feeling so much, and she needed to make him feel it, too. This was the last time she’d be able to tell him anything, but she couldn’t find the fucking words. It was like Cora and her rorqual colors, maybe. The pieces of the world that wouldn’t stay in your grasp, no matter how hard you tried. “You are so loved,” Signy said, frustrated, ardent. “I love you. And you are always going to be my friend.”

Otto mumbled something, a weak semblance of speech. Signy couldn’t understand him, and she knew immediately that attempting to work out what he’d said was going to drive her crazy for the rest of her life. But he looked at her, his oxygen-starved eyelids parting just a sliver. He looked, and he kept looking, and that, she understood. He knew she was there. Perhaps that was enough. Perhaps it could be enough.

Signy kissed his forehead, and she squeezed his hand.

She traded places with Sam on the couch once it was her turn to sleep. She curled into a ball and wrapped herself in a hideous blanket Ramona had made years ago. The knit threads were still warm from its former occupant. The heap of throw pillows accompanying it would have to do. Signy could feel that her neck was going to hate this situation by morning, but she was too tired to care.

It ended up not mattering. Sam woke her only two hours later. She woke everyone else, too. They gathered in his room, and they sat with his body until kind strangers came to take it away.

Chapter 47 Cora, Fortune