Girls Save the World in This One - Ash Parsons Page 0,69

out there working to contain it.”

“If,” Mia says. “We have to face that we don’t really know anything.”

“I wish I could call my parents,” Imani says. “They’d know what we should do.” Even though her voice is steady, I can tell she’s feeling it, and I’m feeling it, too.

The edge of tears, honed on the sharp longing to be out of here. To be safe in the circle of our parents’ arms.

I reach out and give her a one-armed hug. Imani leans down and rests her head on my shoulder for a moment.

“Do you really think everyone else onstage got out?” Simon asks us. “James, he was helping people. Hunter was with him. And Sam, he moves slow sometimes, because of his knees . . .”

Simon’s voice trails off, and I can see him picturing more of them: his fellow actors, castmates he’s worked with for the past three years. People who he’s come to call friends.

“They’re fine.” Mia’s voice is tough. No nonsense. “They’re just like us, fighting their way through this mess. That’s what we’ve got to keep doing.”

“Yeah,” Annie says. “Sam’s a tough old bird. Remember that day he had to film the fight scene with the barn zombie? He wouldn’t quit until it was right.”

Imani stands up straight. She smooths her tunic. “We’re not the only ones who got out of that ballroom. We’re going to find others. We keep looking,” she tells me.

Simon picks up his vanity stool and shifts his grip.

“Let’s go,” he says. “We should clear this level, for safety. We should check the bathrooms for zombies, then the lobby and sitting area, then we can try to make contact with those survivors in the balcony and figure out about the dampener or what’s next from there.”

I nod, and we form an impromptu phalanx—me and Simon in the lead; Janet and Linus in the rear; Imani, Mia, and Annie in the middle.

Around the corner from the escalators is a wide, extremely long lobby. There are upholstered chairs set in conversational groups at intervals beside the railing that runs alongside the escalator area. More chairs and sofas are set down the exterior window wall beyond that.

Bathrooms are up near us, catty-corner to the escalators. At the far side of the lobby, on the wall opposite the bathrooms, a long bar stands. Barstools are bolted to the floor in front of it, and a small flotilla of tall cocktail tables is scattered before them.

The balcony of the ballroom is separated from the lobby by a large semicircular wall bowing out in an arc. Four pairs of closed double doors are set in the curved wall.

Behind those doors is where I think other survivors are: the cheerleaders and stuntmen I saw climb up, and any others they managed to save from the ballroom floor.

Simon and I lead the way to the first set of balcony doors. I put my ear to it, but can hear nothing.

I reach out to the handle. My fingers curl around it.

The rough voice echoes out across the lobby, shocking me so hard I jump.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, sister.”

My head whips to the right, toward the bar.

Cuellar Tucker, the actor who plays the tough redneck, stands with an elbow on the bar, foot up on the rung of a barstool like we’re in a western and he’s about to mount his horse.

“Cuellar!” Simon’s voice is tinged with relief.

My hand drops from the balcony door. We step back from the doors and cross to the bar.

“It’s okay to come out,” Cuellar says to the bar behind him.

Then, sprouting over the top of the bar like a cautious lily, the bright white top of Siggy’s hair. Blair is close to her, both their eyes wide as saucers, wider still to see us standing there.

“Siggy!” Imani rushes forward, meeting Siggy at the corner of the bar. They hug, and Imani reaches out to grab Blair’s elbow.

Blair clasps Imani’s arm back, both looking surprised, and relieved, at the