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“Just a baby.”

“I know.”

“He cried.”

“Kids cry,” I repeat, trying to keep my voice from breaking.

“No… He was scared, Ade,” John rasps resolutely. “Don’t… leave him there.”

Tears burn behind my eyelids. “You’re going to go home, John. You’ll get him out.”

John shakes his head, just barely, with what strength he has left. “Promise me, Ade.”

“You’re going home.”

“Promise… me.”

I choke. “Okay, I promise. I promise.”

His fingers tighten once before loosening one by one. “Take… care… of my… boy.”

“I swear I will.”

His eyes close. I press his cold, dust-caked hand flat against my chest, right over the frantic, useless hammering of my heart. The ringing in my ears sharpens to a single high-frequency shriek. His chest barely rises, then falls for the last time in a shallow, wet rattle.

“John?”

I press my forehead hard into his knuckles. My whole body convulses with a tremor I can’t control. Around us, the chaos solidifies—the metallic clatter of a medkit hitting rubble, Osbourne shouting coordinates into his radio, boots crunching over broken concrete.

I don’t let go.

I hold John’s hand tighter, feeling the rough skin of his palm, the familiar calluses from years of handling a rifle, until the tension leaves his fingers completely, and they go slack and heavy in mine.

I stay there, forehead pressed to the cooling back of his hand, as the sun breaks over the shattered skyline. Light cuts through the settling dust. The world keeps moving—engines revving somewhere down the street, another squad arriving—but I don’t lift my head.

“I promise,” I whisper into his skin, my voice raw. “I fucking promise.”

1

Kamden

I sit cross-legged on my bedroom floor, my comforter pulled into a nest beneath me to hide the worn carpet, and the yellow desk lamp throwing a warm circle of light over the mess spread around my knees.

There are magazine clippings, pattern paper stolen from the fabric store’s recycling bin, and half-finished sketches drawn on notebook paper, fast-food restaurant napkins, and the backs of old school assignments.

My pencil glides almost on its own, carving lines into blank paper. Long sleeves that flutter like wings. A dropped waist that skims over hips. Soft pleats that catch the light. And a dramatic neckline, steep and daring. I trace the curve of fabric with my fingertip and feel a thrill in my chest. A small smile spreads across my face before I even notice.

“One day,” I whisper, the words a secret spell.

In this house, even whispers can feel dangerous. Dreams echo louder than the arguments drifting through the walls.

I glance toward my closed bedroom door, straining to listen for any sounds, but the rest of the house remains still. Not peaceful, exactly. Peace is something softer than this, something that doesn’t require me to count every creak of the floorboards or hold my breath whenever the pipes knock behind the walls.

This is only a temporary quiet.

Still, I’d take a small moment of calm over constant chaos any day, even if it never lasts very long.

I lower my head and return to the dress, shading beneath the pleats until I can almost imagine the fabric shifting beneath bright runway lights. It would be silk if I had the choice, something pale and weightless, the color of the sky just before sunrise. Maybe an icy blue or pale lavender, but definitely something that changes depending on the angle, soft enough to look like it has been spun from clouds.