The Fire Witness

94

Tuula mumbles that she’s tired. She wiggles out of Daniel’s embrace and walks to the window. She starts to lick the glass.

“Have you ever heard Vicky say something?” asks Daniel.

“Like what?”

“That she has a hiding place somewhere or places where-”

“Nope,” Tuula says, turning toward him.

“But you like to listen to the bigger girls when they talk,” Daniel says.

“So do you,” Tuula replies.

“I know,” Daniel says. “But right now I’m having trouble remembering things. The doctor calls it ‘arousal.’”

“Is it dangerous?”

He shakes his head but he does not try to smile.

“I go to a psychologist and I get drugs for it.”

“Don’t be sad,” she says, and she cocks her head. “It was a good thing that Miranda and Elisabet were killed. There are too many people on the planet anyway.”

“I loved Elisabet, I needed her and-”

Tuula slams her head backward into the windowpane and cracks the glass.

“The best thing for me to do right now is to hide behind the dresser in my room,” she says.

“Wait a moment.”