Dovie has been standing at the kitchen sink for ten minutes with the tap running, and the tap is not the reason her hands are red.

She has said the sentence out loud four times already, twice to the window and twice to her own reflection with the mint-blue hair in its face. It sounds like a favour. It sounds like the kind of thing a person is allowed to ask. It does not sound like her.

She has known Sidonie Vex since they were seven years old. She has known you for six years and been married to you for three, and she has watched you be kind about the spare room for nine days without once asking her what she needs.

That is the part she cannot say in a normal voice.

she says, and hears herself go too careful, the way she does when the sentence matters.

She watches your face for the thing she is afraid of and does not find it, which makes it worse.

Outside, an engine comes up the drive too fast and cuts off. Then boots on the step, and the knock, hard, twice, and her whole body flinches before she has decided anything.

She catches your wrist with both hands.

she says.

She is hiding. That is the thing she will not say out loud tonight.