back and forth between them. They looked focused, ready, as if they had been practicing for this. Sandra returned to James on the porch and drilled him: What was Finn wearing? How tall? How heavy? Where did he like to go?
James pressed a button on his camera and they watched Finn on the small screen, jumping and yelling in his panda suit, bouncing in the leaves. Chuckles appeared and watched, too. Sandra put a hand on James’s shoulder and squeezed.
James turned off the camera and went through Sandra’s questions, one by one. He knew every answer.
The buzzer was broken. Ana knocked loudly. No one came to the door. She stood on the porch, glancing at the stained seats from the car, wondered if there was a key hidden inside one of the tears. Then she tried the handle of the door, and with a turn, it opened.
The shoes remained in their jumble. Today the hallway smelled of vinegar. She moved up the staircase, hand on the loose rail. She could hear the explosions, the sound of gunfire and battle. She knocked.
“Come in!” a voice called. Ana opened the door. Charlie’s roommate was on the couch, console in hand, thumbs flying. Charlie sat next to him, attached by a chord to his own plastic box. He glanced at her once, blankly, then again with recognition. Startled, he dropped the box.
“Ana!” He stood.
“No! Chuck! Keep going!” shouted Russell, grabbing for Charlie’s box, trying to work two of them, one in each hand.
“What are you doing here? I mean, it’s fine, it’s great—”
“I wanted to give you something,” said Ana.
“NOOOO!” Russell shouted. “NOOOO!” His forehead was slick with sweat.
“Okay, this is – the kitchen’s a mess—” said Charlie.
“Should we go to your room?” He opened his eyes wide, nodded. Ana followed him down a corridor.
“Sit down,” he said. The bed, tidily made, filled almost the entire room, so Ana sat on the edge of it. A white curtain covered the window. Charlie grabbed a wadded T-shirt from the sheets and tossed it into the old armoire.
“You don’t have much stuff,” said Ana.
“Really? I always feel like I have too much.”
He stood in front of her, and then sat down. They were shoulder to shoulder, as if sitting on a bus. Ana reached into her purse and pulled out a brown paper bag.
“Here,” she said. Charlie removed a black notebook. He flipped through its empty lined pages.
“Thank you. I’m not sure – what made you—”
“I saw it. I don’t think you should get a BlackBerry. I think this is better.”
Charlie laughed. “A one-woman campaign against technology.”
“It’s also a bribe,” said Ana. “I might be going away for a little while. I’m not sure. I want you to take care of my mother. Will you do that for me? Will you just keep an eye on her until I get back?”
“Of course,” he said. “I’m always looking out for her, Ana. Even if you didn’t ask me, I would.” He tried to catch her eye, but she was gazing at the curtain. “Where are you going?”
Ana saw upon the white canvas of the curtain faint lines like rivers, crossing and cutting.
“I don’t know,” she said. She could feel Charlie’s arm near hers, the fraction of space between them. She could imagine her hands on his neck, the roughness of his jaw. She could feel it without doing it, even the aftershocks, the mess. And then she thought: No, it’s not true: in fact, you don’t know how this will turn out. She had always tried so hard to anticipate every step before it landed, but now she didn’t even know who would be in her home, or where that home would be. And that thought set her freight free.
Ana stood.
“Thank you,” she said, turning for the door.
“Ana, wait—” But she was gone, through the battle and the electronic bloodshed, past the man on the couch who was wailing now as if he were injured.
Outside, she moved fast through the trick-or-treaters. The sound of fireworks had begun, explosions in the distance, some nearby, but untraceable, popping from alleys and behind cars. The sky, far away, was streaked hot red.
James knew Finn’s height, his weight, the colour of his socks. He repeated these things.
Ana turned onto their block. She watched a man and woman walking quickly, knocking on one door and the next, like urgent trick-or-treaters without a child. Then she saw the crowd on the sidewalk in front of the house, James in the centre. She