Free Range by J.A. Huss

out the kids either, everyone sits together—rubbing elbows and kicking each other under the table due to lack of space.
    No ever complains that there's not enough room.
    It's late right now so I've missed dinner by hours, but the kitchen comes alive and they usher me to another table. Not the family dinner table, but the game table that's part of the open kitchen space. All the adults sit with me and listen to my story quietly and then the space in front of me is filled with rice and carnitas. I wash it all down with cerveza and shots of tequila and enjoy my surrogate family while I can. We push the bad aside and get loud and animated playing cards and laughing. And I really do forget, if only for an hour or two, that my world is falling apart. It's easy to forget all the bad stuff when I'm here with them.
    Later, Hand leads me through the concrete maze of roads and buildings that is the interior Hando compound until we find his house. We're both half drunk and happy as he shuttles me into his living room and pushes me down on the couch.
    "Stay here for a minute, OK? I'm gonna go get you some clothes from Mia real fast."
    I stare up at him, his eyes hidden from me in the shadows.
    "What?"
    I shake my head and sigh. "You're a good guy, know that, John?"
    He laughs at my use of his given name. No one calls him John, not even his mother. "You know better, Junco. You of all people know that I'm about the farthest thing from a good guy there is."
    "You're wrong."
    I make out a smile as he leaves to go find his sister Mia.
    The couch is soft and I lean back and let out a deep breath.
    Isten .
    I push him away because there's another name on my mind right now.
    Tier.
    The alcohol makes me want to call for him in my head. The name wants to be spoken so badly but there is no one to speak it to, so I can only say it to myself. The last time we were really together it was on the ship. The night before the drop into the MR before we got my Siblings back. I should've told him I thought I was pregnant because then we would've had a chance to talk about it. Make it real. Now it feels like a dream, like it never happened.
    At least to me it does, but obviously Tier doesn't feel the same way. I did choose Gideon, but not for the reason he thinks. I cannot even imagine what it would be like to lose Gideon. It makes me choke down a sob just thinking about it and it's not because I love him the same way I love Tier. It's just that Gideon has always been there for me. Even if he was gone doing—whatever they used to make him do when I was little—I knew he'd be back.
    And he always did come back. Until all that shit happened before graduation. I have a feeling that's when that picture Gideon showed me back in the Runout tunnels was taken. During the worst days of my life. But somehow his hand draped across my shoulder was enough to make me smile for the seconds it took to capture my fleeting happiness forever.
    I have a sickening suspicion that my bouts of instability have something to do with Gid being erased from my memory. Without Gideon I am a monster. Without Gideon I have no direction. That little compass Tier gave me was wrong. My one true direction lies through Gideon because Lucan isn't the Devil. I am. Gid is the only thing that makes me good. Without Gideon I'm more than bad, I'm evil.
    I feel this to be true and maybe I did choose him over the baby. I don't think of it that way, but if Tier does, then whatever. I get it. He's allowed to have his perspective. And I can't even tell him I'm sorry about it because actually, I'm not sorry.
    I chose Gideon.
    And then I chose Lucan.
    And the only person I want is Tier. But since when do my desires ever fucking matter?
    Never, that's when.
    Never.
    Hand comes back in the house and tosses me some clothes. "She gave you some jeans and a t-shirt. Plus a jacket for when you leave. That OK?"
    I nod a little. "Yeah, that's perfect, Hand. Make sure you tell her I said thanks." I get up and try to