Zip heard the slip of his shoes on the rain-soaked fire escape before his cracked knuckles rapped at the window, but she took her time scooting away from her desk and slinking across the room to unlock her window. She turned around as he slipped in through the crack, bleeding into the bright space like an ink stain spreading across the surface it has chosen to penetrate. From the corner of her eye, as she picks up her pen to resume her homework, she can see that he’s shivering and his eyes are wide and bleary in the deep set of his face.
“Take off your jacket and get into bed,” she said softly, hoping that through the thin walls his entrance hadn’t been heard. “You’re making a puddle on the floor.”
He nodded without looking at her, the hair that looked like a black brushstroke against his scalp shook free, just a smidgen. “Sorry,” he mumbled. He peeled his jacket off his wet skin, pale and glimmering from the cold and the wet. His sneakers and socks followed before he crawled into bed, burrowing himself below Tzipporah’s covers. She winced a little at the sigh he made, knowing that he probably hadn’t been in a bed this week and that when she herself went to bed tonight, a giant puddle would be waiting for her.
She decided it was probably worth it.
“Did you go home?” she asked absently, not looking in his direction.
Elias shook his head, pressing his forehead against the top of his knees. “No,” he sighed. “Mom just left. Dad has been taking extra shifts at night.” Then, softer, “I don’t blame him.”