DANTE

I looked at Kira.

At the face I had been looking at for over a year across every version of a year could be, the hard versions and the good versions and the ones that were both at the same time.

I had prepared many things to say.

None of them were what I said.

"A year ago I found you at the border," I said. "Half-dead and furious about it, which I should have understood immediately as the full picture of who you are." I heard something from the room, not quite laughter. "I didn't ...