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[SCRUB]

Mom's lemon soap foams gray around the oval on my wrist.

Thursday's stamp didn't stay on the tickets. Some of it came home on me: a faint blue ring on the bony part of my wrist, half a letter caught inside it, one edge smeared where I wiped my forehead in the middle of the line.

I scrub. The water runs warm, then hot. The oval fades to the color of a vein and stops there, like it has decided exactly how much of yesterday it is willing to give back.

I turn off the tap.

Through the wall, a phone chimes in Mom and Dad's room. Three soft rising notes. It cuts off halfway through the fourth.

Snoozed.

I stand there with wet hands and wait. Toothbrush. Socks. Nine minutes later it chimes again. Cuts off again.

I didn't know adults could hit snooze. I thought they came already awake, like the fridge.

When Dad finally comes down, his tie is a loose knot and the newspaper stays folded under his arm, unread, like a shield he forgot to raise. He drinks his tea standing up. That's my move.

"Long week," he says, before Mom can ask. Then he sees me watching and finds a smile somewhere behind his glasses. "Ticket man. How's the wrist?"

I hold it out.

"Battle damage," he says, and taps the oval once. His finger is warm from the mug.

All the way to the bus stop I keep hearing the snooze. Two taps. Nine minutes each. Nobody yelled. Nobody missed anything. It was small.

It still sounded like something I know. A blip on long-range scan, too far away to name.

***

Bus. Leo has the seat saved, bag on it like always. He moves the bag when I get close, like always.

Then he looks out the window and says nothing, which is not like always.

Usually Leo has a systems check ready before I sit down. Today he's running his thumbnail along the rubber seam of the seat in front of us, back and forth, like the seam owes him an answer.

I know that face. I've worn it. It's the face you make while you decide if something is worth saying out loud.

For two whole stops I wait for him to fix it himself. Leo always fixes it himself.

He doesn't.

Item one on the checklist says Answer Leo when he asks. It never said what to do when he doesn't ask.

"Damage report," I say.

He blinks. "What?"

"You're doing the seam thing. Engineering's quiet. Captain's asking."

It comes out stiff, like lines from somebody else's script. But it comes out.

Leo lets out a breath that fogs a small circle on the glass. "It's dumb."

"I've said dumber things on this bus."

Half a grin. Then: "I never deleted the save."

"What save?"

"Mission seven. From that night." He doesn't have to say which night. The night he paused the game and told me I kept leaving him alone in the open. "We never finished it. Every time I turn the console on, it asks if I want to resume. I keep saying no." He picks at the seam. "It's a two-player save."

Something tilts under my ribs.

All those weeks he stood at rails. Hung back three steps. Pretended to read books he wasn't reading. I logged every one of my own burns like mine were the only engines in the sky.

"You've been booth guy. Window guy. Name's-Dave guy," Leo says. "I'm proud. For real." He shrugs at the seam. "I also have a couch. And a dog who thinks you only come over on weekends with emergencies."

"Tomorrow," I say. "Your place. We finish seven."

He studies me the way he used to study my worksheets, hunting for blank lines. "You don't have a stamp emergency?"

"The stamp lives on a chain. It can't follow me."

That gets the whole grin.

***

Before first bell, Amber catches me outside the office glass. The half-door is shut. The stamp hangs on its chain like a sleeping animal.

"Heads up for Tuesday," she says. "I've got a club thing. I'll be ten minutes late. Maybe fifteen."

"Okay." Then my brain catches up. "Who opens?"

She doesn't answer. She just looks at me and lets me get there on my own.

"Oh."

"Ms. Carter keeps the cash box key. Count the float before you sell anything. Write the number on the sheet." She taps the glass where a laminated card is taped on the inside: OPEN. COUNT. LOG. CLOSE. "That's the whole job."

"That's the whole job," I repeat, like it's small. It doesn't feel small. It feels like being handed the controls with the bridge empty.

"You stamped forty-one tickets Thursday," Amber says. "I counted. You can count coins."

She's gone into the hallway current before I can argue.

***

[SQUEAK]

Leo's gate still complains. The dog still doesn't. He hits my knees at full speed, all wag and claws, then sits on my sneakers like he's making sure I can't leave again.

Inside: microwave popcorn, old carpet, the warm-plastic smell of a console left on standby too long. Leo's mom waves a dish towel from the kitchen. "Two Saturdays in a month, look at you." I laugh, even though it lands somewhere soft.

Leo turns the console on. The menu music plays, polite and empty.

Then the box pops up.

RESUME MISSION 7: HOLD THE LINE? (2P)

The date underneath is from weeks ago. Before the clipboard. Before the far bins. Before I said my name to anybody.

The cursor is already sitting on NO. He's picked it so many times the game learned to guess.

Two Saturdays ago I sat on this exact carpet while he picked NO, and I never even looked at the screen. Too busy being the only ship.

He hands me the second controller. "Your call, Captain."

I press YES.

The frozen frame jolts alive mid-dogfight, right where we abandoned it: shields at thirty, an enemy wing glued to our tail, an asteroid field filling the right side of the screen like a wall of teeth.

[BOOM]

"Oh, it's bad," Leo says. "I forgot how bad we left it."

"We left it in the middle."

"The middle is the worst place."

The first two minutes are rusty. I overshoot a turn. Leo vents the wrong coolant and swears at it in a whisper so his mom won't hear. The dog barks once at an explosion, then gives up and rests his chin on my sock.

Then the big wave comes, and it's Leo who freezes.

Not all the way. Just his thumbs going still on the sticks while three fighters peel off toward his side of the ship. His mouth opens. Nothing comes out.

I've lived that exact half-second from the inside a hundred times. I never saw what it looks like from the outside. It looks small. Quiet. Easy to miss if you're watching the screen instead of the person.

I don't grab his controller. He never grabbed mine.

"Burn left," I say. "I've got the rear."

His thumbs move.

We clear it by a pixel. The timer runs out with our shields at four percent and a chime like a door finally unlocking.

MISSION COMPLETE.

Neither of us cheers. We just sit on the carpet, breathing like we ran somewhere.

The cockpit used to be where I went to hide. Today I came back to it for somebody else. Same couch. Different mission.

"I checked the date on that save, like, four times," Leo says after a while. His ears go pink. "I'm not weird. I just noticed."

"You're a little weird."

"Engineering is allowed to be weird."

The menu offers mission eight. We don't start it. Not because we're scared. Because Leo's mom calls us for grilled cheese, butter and burnt edges, and it turns out I want that more than another wave.

Halfway through his sandwich, Leo says, not looking up, "Tuesday. You don't need me at the rail, right?"

I almost say I always need you at the rail. It would be true in the cozy way. It would also be one more seat I'm saving for myself.

"There's a pickup game in the courtyard every window hour," I say. "I've watched it through the glass. You always pass to people. Go get passed to."

He chews. Thinks. "Co-pilot reassigned?"

"Co-pilot on his own ship. Same fleet."

He nods slowly, like it might be the best upgrade we ever argued about.

***

That night I take the old scrap off my nightstand, the Silk Road sentence on top, and underneath it, graphite gone shiny from my thumb: Don't leave Leo flying solo.

I don't throw it away. I flip it over and write on the back, small:

He never left me either. Both ways.

***

Tuesday. Last lunch bell.

The half-door is shut. No Amber. The other booth kid leans on the wall eating chips out of a crinkly bag, which means he is waiting for somebody to be in charge.

Somebody is apparently me.

The key is in Ms. Carter's room. That means asking.

Her door is open. She's grading with a red pen, a stack of quizzes squared at her elbow. I stop in the doorway the way Ryan did weeks ago, except Ryan leaned like he owned the doorway and I stand like I'm renting it by the second.

"Ms. Carter? Amber's late. I need the cash box key. To open."

She doesn't turn it into a moment. She opens a drawer.

[JINGLE]

A small brass key on a ring. "Count the float first. Out loud helps. Write the number down before you sell anything." Then, as I turn: "Dave. Good. You asked before the controls froze."

I didn't know she remembered saying that. Apparently teachers keep logs too.

The cash box is cold and heavier than it looks. Inside: a rubber-banded fold of bills and a tray of coins in little round wells. I count out loud, quiet, while the booth kid crunches chips beside me like a metronome. In my head it's a fuel check before launch, which actually helps, as long as my eyes stay on the real coins. They smell sour and metal. I lose count in the quarters and start over. Nobody laughs. The second time, my number matches Thursday's closing line on the sheet.

I write it down. Small handwriting. Still there.

I unhook the stamp. Test press on scrap. Clean oval.

I lift the half-door.

[CLACK]

The line isn't long. Four kids, then six. Without Amber beside me, my voice has to do the parts hers did. "Next." "That's two." "Hold on, I'll get change." The first next comes out like a cough. By the third, it sounds like a word.

Then Ryan.

He isn't in the line, exactly. He walks up along the side holding a ticket between two fingers like evidence. My stamp is on it. Thursday's oval, extra dark, because I stamped that one harder than necessary. Ryan never stood in my line. The fountain kid who asked if Invisible Seat does tickets now did. Now the ticket is in Ryan's fingers like it was always his.

"Refund," he says, loud enough for the line. "Remember? Somebody asks for a refund and you..." He wiggles his fingers. Poof.

He said it on the bus as a joke. He's here to find out if the joke was true.

The heat comes. So does the old pull: courtyard corner, bathroom tile, six kids who would happily watch me vanish. In my head the Vanguard pops an escape pod with my name stenciled on the hatch.

I look at the laminated card instead. OPEN. COUNT. LOG. CLOSE. Under it, in Amber's handwriting: Refunds = teacher slip.

"Refunds need a slip from Ms. Carter," I say. "Her room's open. I just came from there."

Ryan blinks. He was ready for me to cave or freeze. He wasn't ready for a rule.

"Seriously?"

"It's on the card." I turn it so he can read it. "I'll hold your spot."

The line goes very quiet. Then Ryan goes. He actually goes, sneakers squeaking down the hall, cologne trailing behind him like exhaust.

I sell three more tickets. My hands don't shake. Okay. A little.

He comes back with a slip, Ms. Carter's red signature slanting across it like she signed without looking up, and slaps it on the counter harder than he needs to.

I count his money out loud into his palm, coin by coin. I log it: REFUND, 1, and my initials.

"Took you long enough," he says.

It took ninety seconds. We both know it.

"Next," I say.

He leaves with his money and no joke. Not beaten. Just nothing left to chew on.

Amber arrives out of breath, club lanyard still swinging. She stops at the counter and reads the sheet. The float. The refund. My initials, twice.

"You opened," she says.

"I asked for the key."

She reads the refund line again. Her eyebrows rise their one millimeter. "Ryan?"

"He needed a slip."

She laughs. Short and surprised and real. It's the first time I've heard her laugh at something I did on purpose. Then she ties on her apron and doesn't take the stamp out of my hand.

Through the office glass, a pickup game is running across the courtyard grass. Somebody passes to Leo. He traps it, laughs, boots it wide, and somebody else yells his name like it belongs in the open air. Not at the rail. In the middle of everything, loud, exactly where he fits.

He spots me through the glass mid-run and throws up two fingers.

I lift the stamp back.

At close, I count the box out loud again. It matches. I write the number. In my head a little status light clicks from amber to green, and I let it, because this time the light is only describing what my hands already did.

Amber chains the stamp and says, like it's nothing, "Booth kids eat at the pillar table Thursday. You can sit with us. Bring Leo if he can stop being popular for twenty minutes."

The pillar table. Where the clipboard used to hang. Where the loud names sit.

"Thursday," I say. Not maybe. Not I'll look.

Walking to class, I check my wrist. Thursday's oval scrubbed away days ago. Today's sits in the exact same spot, dark and fresh and slightly crooked, like it knew where to land.

Return ink.

I don't scrub this one off yet.