Chapter 1

                                    

                                          
My skinned knees are the same color as my cherry-red bicycle. I inhale sharply, tenderly evaluating the damage. A delivery robot had materialized in the path of my turn, and I am now left with a half torn canvas, gutted bike, and a robot that will not stop asking me for my assistance in getting back on route. I do so, chipping the plastic in the process. I'm in the mood to kick it, but refrain from doing so when I remember they have cameras now.
	"Thank you," the artificial intelligence garbles in tune with the whirr of its wheels.
	I don't wait until it has disappeared to start to remove the tracks of mud off of my canvas. My hands sting as I do. The assault of nature has left the charcoal resembling more of a black cloud rather than the bird it is supposed to be. I wipe the dirt from my brow. I swing the ruined work in one arm and the remains of the bike in the other. A thin line of sunrise lights my way.
	I throw the tattered fourth place ribbon in a public garbage can, which politely reminds me to think of the on-going climate crisis before tossing my belongings. I approach my house, indistinguishable from the other houses in the row and just as ugly too. The yellow grass we call a "lawn" in front of the one-story would make me laugh if it wasn't my own. I knock the dirt from my boots before opening the door.
The hallway bathes in a hazy yellow light. Almost pretty, if it didn't accompany the smoke and whizz of cars passing by. And they call New York City the city that never sleeps... I sigh, wiping a bead of sweat away. My lips taste of salt.
	My mother is the opposite, the one who is always in her dreams. I'm not sure if it's cigarettes or the pills that keep her in permanent residency on the living room couch. I'm sure of her absence, however. Everything seems like one of my mother's dreams, blurred and not quite real.
	I do my routine as I always do. I count the yellowing family photos on the walls. I straighten decorative dishes on the table before finally making my way to the door. A soft breeze greets me. An inch of the open front door is all it takes to send a chill down my spine. Two minutes was all it took, two minutes for someone to come inside.
But my small world is an eerie normal. My mom passed out on the couch surrounded by case notes, the buzz of a streetlamp and the stink of TV dinners and a soggy roof still hung in the air. Normal except for the lump in my throat. Nothing was out of place except the open door. And that made my blood run colder than if everything was in disarray.
	I take my time bringing my hand to the cool metal of the gun at my waist, hidden beneath my oversized jacket. One advantage to always being paranoid: you're always prepared. I count each shaky breath.
Is this what a panic attack feels like? Where every nerve is alight and each breath feels like your last? My coward's heart begs me to stop. Call the police. But what would they do? Show up again too late to save my medication and school laptop that I saved all summer to buy? Arrest me for an unlicensed firearm? 
I hear an indiscrete rustling in tandem with the bang of footsteps on the wooden floor. Maybe there will be many of them like last time. At least that's what I expected when I slammed open the door. Not the face of a shocked boy just about my age, who is now looking down the barrel of my dad's old pistol.
"Who the hell are you!?" I shout. At least I wanted to, but it resembles more of a dog's whimper.
"My name is Payne," the boy says in an eerie calm, tan hands in the air as he turns to face me. His voice is smooth, like a Sunday morning news report, not someone who had a gun to his face. He has golden brown hair and tanned skin like a soccer player. Only one thing stands out, the thin red lines that wrap themselves like vines around his hands.
"Are you Professor Andrews' daughter?" Payne asks, voice still buttery smooth. He regards me carefully, eyes flickering between me and the gun.
"And why do you want to know?" I still aim the pistol at him, but my heart rate slows. He doesn't remind me of the robbers you see in movies, with masked faces and burlap sacks.